


Tag Is A Game Demons Play

by fadeverb



Series: Leo [9]
Category: In Nomine
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-30
Updated: 2013-08-01
Packaged: 2017-12-21 20:25:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 66,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/904526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fadeverb/pseuds/fadeverb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Theft has a job for Leo. Did it mention that it takes place inside a Tether of the Sword? Yes? Well, he'd better cope.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In Which Home Is Unfamiliar Territory

When I open my eyes I can't see a damn thing. Not a good sign. Nor is the part where my skull feels like someone's taken a nail-studded two-by-four to the back of it. Which...may have happened, now that I review my memory and find fuzziness on recent events. I'm clear on the part where Zhune and I were supposed to swipe some files from a Tether of the War, and...okay, something happened after that, but I can't work out what. My head hurts when I try to think about it.

Sitting up makes my stomach churn. Just what I needed to complement the pounding headache. My eyes are adjusting to the darkness in here, enough to pinpoint the one source of light: the unsteady red glow of a lump stuffed into a niche in the wall.

"Oh, fuck," I say, to no one in particular, and stumble forward to stare at my Heart. Post-Trauma memory loss, for the second time. Coming out of Trauma seems to be worse every time it happens, judging by this third encounter with the phenomenon. But resting one palm on my Heart is enough to reduce the headache, calm my guts, and make me feel a little less...dead. Only corporeally dead, but it hurts enough to count. I wonder if Zhune lost his vessel too; the last I remember, he was on the other side of the building, being...distracting, I think. I wish I could remember what the plan was, so that I could figure out how to not make the same mistake next time.

There's not much light in here to see by, only the flickering of my Heart (it's chanting at me, a sort of rill of the dissonance condition bound into it and from there into me, but I'm not listening to that) and other Hearts in the area to outline the edges of things. The room's small, and oddly shaped, full of crevices and corners too full of shadows for me to make anything out. There's a hallway--I think--that this room connects to through a doorway small enough I'll need to duck to pass through.

I was fond of the lake of fire where my first Heart was kept. The barracks where the War stuffed it was too brief an encounter for me to have an opinion on it, except for the part where I was angry enough to smash that Heart and run. In retrospect, probably a bad decision. Now I'm in a Principality I've never set foot in before, with no idea where I'm supposed to go, or if I'll ever get back to the corporeal again.

Maybe sticking to Hell for a few years would be a pleasant change of pace. Not that Hell's pleasant for most people, but I can do a decent job of blowing things to pieces, which should get me some breathing space. Nobody will care about my Discord around here, not with how meaningless it is on the celestial. And I could...do something?

Come to think of it, I have no idea what I'd do in Hell. I've never spent time on the celestial plane without someone ordering me around constantly. Now there's a depressing thought. I'll add it to the long list of things I'm in denial about, once I manage to find a way out of here.

The scrape of claws against stone gives me reason to think about more pressing matters than the latest addition to my issues. The doorway remains a darker blotch on a dark wall, then goes odd around the edges as something makes its way inside.

Djinn, I think, judging by the light of my Heart once it's inside. Some of that Band look like crossbreeds of two animals that shouldn't get within spitting distance of each other, or twisted versions of some identifiable breed. This one is a mass of eye-clusters and shining fangs, dozens of claws stalking forward across the floor. Or an oddly solid Shedite, because if there's not enough slime for a Shedite, it's the creepiest Stalker I've seen.

...and then it's Zhune, the image of his corporeal vessel wrapped around him. Tall, dark, and handsome. He could play James Bond if he worked for Nybbas. His true form lingers underneath, but if I don't think about it I can ignore that shadow on the image. "You're awake," he says, and sounds pleased. "How are you feeling?"

"Like my Forces have been shoved through a screen door and reassembled on the other side. How long was I out?" I straighten up without intending to; standing next to him makes me feel short on the corporeal, which my vessel admittedly is. Was. His vessel-image is taller than I am in my true form.

"Three weeks. I was starting to worry." He wasn't, of course. Djinn don't. But he smiles when he says it, a white-toothed grin in the dark that's meant to be reassuring, and somehow makes me feel slightly better. Zhune only sticks this close to me because he was told to do so, but he _will_ watch my back. "You usually hang around in Trauma that long? Because if I'd known, I would have brought a deck of cards."

"I have three data points, so all I can say is that it's the longest yet." I stuff my hands in my pockets, and find there's a pistol in there, a battered hand-me-down from Regan left over from my service to the War. "You didn't have anything better to do than sit in the dark waiting for me to wake up?"

"Not a thing," Zhune says, and throws an arm over my shoulders. "Come on. Let's get out of here."

I do have to duck to get through the doorway, my horns scraping along stone with a rasp that makes my headache worse. I'm not fond of this stone theme they have going in the local architecture. "So where's the door?"

"The front door," Zhune says, and points, not that I can see his hand in the darkness, "is that way. We don't go that way. The Djinn there are bigger than I am, and are allowed to eat people who show up without proper authorization, which generally means the presence of our Prince. No, we're heading out the back doors."

"One-way exits?"

"Exactly." He guides me at a brisk pace when I'd rather amble, but I'm not in any position to argue, even if the arm over my shoulders is more possessive that I'm comfortable with. He's not as clingy as some Djinn, and not as prone to engaging in mindfucks as Regan, so I can live with it. I don't have any better allies to turn to. Or, let me be honest with myself, any other allies, period. For being a polite and charming guy, I seem to have a lot of trouble keeping friends. Between the ones that stabbed me in the back, the ones I had to send away to keep them safe, and the ones that don't count because they're on the other side of the War...

I'm not sure if the problem is me being too nice or too much of a jerk. But either way, it's probably my fault. Maybe being a demon doesn't lend itself well to long-term relationships, and I've spent too much time reading human literature that suggests these things are possible. I'm the first to admit that the demonic psyche is not suited to playing well with others. Still, you'd think more of us would be able to work with the concept of enlightened self-interest and the utility of allies you can _count_ on.

The hall branches half a dozen times, and I can't track the path Zhune is taking; sometimes it seems like we're moving in circles. Maybe it's an answer to my question, that I'm uncomfortable trusting Zhune to lead me this far, when he's been watching my back with Djinnish reliability for close to a year. We're too aware of how selfish we are to trust any other demon to do better.

And then three sharp turns, the floor tilting more steeply down at each stretch, take us to a dead end with a door in the wall. A door in the wall with a sign over the top proclaiming EXIT. Someone's scrawled in an S between the I and T in glow-in-the-dark paint. "You have to be kidding me."

Zhune laughs. "You'd think! But this is the best way out for where we want to go. The part where it looks like an obvious trap is part of its quaint charm."

"I'll take your word for it." But I let him open the door, stepping back a pace first. Sometimes the obvious trap really is the obvious trap.

Not in this case. The door creaks as it opens, but nothing explodes or zaps, and then Zhune tugs me outside into something like open air. "The door doesn't like staying open long," he explains, and as I turn to look behind me it's nothing more than a sketched outline on a rock face. "Precaution against someone being let in through the back entrance, though I'm not sure that's possible. Wait around making up your mind too long, and it's liable to slam shut on you. The squishy kind of on."

"Point taken." I stuff my hands in my pockets, annoyed at the pistol taking up space there. It's probably out of ammunition. Cliffs rise on both sides of us, and the narrow valley we're standing in takes another sharp turn on either side. Above, jagged chunks of rock hang out from the top of the cliffs. This Principality is not big on unobstructed visibility. "In Sheol, it was all about the large pits of flame. Lakes of flame. Fields of flame. Patches of flame. Something of a theme. Fairly straightforward."

"Stygia doesn't do straightforward," Zhune says. He's scanning the sky for something, a frown tugging at his usually relaxed expression. When the Djinn frowns, I start worrying. Since I have no idea what I should be worrying about right now, this means my headache is making itself known. "You haven't been here before?"

"Not this part of Hell. I've spent time in Sheol and Gehenna."

Zhune nods slowly, still watching the sky. "Gehenna's probably the better model of the two, but I haven't been to Sheol, so I can't say for sure. Here's the quick and dirty summary: don't trust anyone, don't believe anyone, and stick close to me."

"It's that dangerous?"

"For you? Probably not. But it's a...call it a _different_ type of dangerous. In Gehenna, doing the wrong thing gets your head shot off. Here, you'll find yourself ass-deep in plots and carrying some pointless trinket seven different groups will kill for and two others will kill you if you lose. Factions does its dry runs here, and reasonable demons can end up with the weirdest allegiances."

I'm getting flashbacks to showing up in Gehenna, and the part where I had to trail Regan like a puppy to avoid the blatant errors that could get me killed. I hate not knowing the territory. 

And maybe that's showing on my face, because Zhune looks down at me and says, "You'll do fine. You're not stupid. Remember that anyone who's friendly is probably trying to recruit you, and that covers ninety percent of the risks."

"The other ten percent?" It's cold here, and there's a nasty wind tugging at the hem of my jacket. For all that I've gone through in Sheol, my first home is looking appealing right now. Hot, flat, and straightforward. Sure, the screaming could get annoying, but it turned into background noise after a few weeks.

"Details," Zhune says, waving it away. He looks me up and down, frown gone. He's seen my latest vessel, but not what I really look like. It's not a huge difference: I'm a little taller, a little less harmless in appearance. Plus the horns and wings, this being the celestial plane. I take a moment to regret my first vessel. It was inconspicuous without making me seem a complete pushover. "You'll need to get rid of the jacket. The rest of the outfit can pass, but that jacket screams Baalite. Wearing that is asking for trouble."

Oh, right. I'd managed to forget that the pistol came with the obligatory soldier's uniform. I don't want to take it off, but raising a fuss will do nothing but draw attention to what I'd rather ignore. I pull the jacket off, and drop it on the ground. Free gun for whoever happens to find it. "What were you looking for up above?"

Zhune doesn't comment on the scars that cover my arms. "Demonlings," he says. "There are flocks of them that lurk near the exits, to jump anyone who comes out looking battered and weak. Nothing dangerous to two like us, but once in a while they'll gather a sufficiently large flock to be inconvenient."

"This would be part of that other ten percent."

"That it would." An arm around my shoulders again, and I'm being led off down the valley. Damn pushy Djinn. He could just _ask_ me to follow. "Look, if you were going to stick around Stygia for a few centuries, it'd be worth your time to learn all the rules. But we're heading back dirtside as soon as we get you equipped with a new vessel, so there's no point in stressing it."

"I'd find that more reassuring if you didn't believe there's _nothing_ worth stressing over."

"Stressing," Zhune proclaims serenely, as we make our way over broken rock, "never does any good. Planning, that's useful. Considering dangers and preparing for them, useful. Stressing makes a person grumpy and twitchy and less effective. So don't."

"Easy for you to say." Grumpy and twitchy I'll own to, but I'm not sure I'd admit to less effective. In the mood to blast anyone who annoys me into a bloody pulp, sure.

"Your problem, Leo, is that you care about things too much. Do your best, and what happens, happens. There will always be parts of the universe you can't control affecting the outcome. Let go of caring about the outcome once you've had your input, and you'll be happier."

"How Zen."

"We're much cooler than Zen," Zhune says, and laughs. "I'll buy you a drink before we get to work, how does that sound? Waking up from Trauma is never pleasant."

From him, that's an apology, and not one I deserve. It's not his fault that I'm wound tight and in unfamiliar territory. "Sounds like a plan," I say, and shove my hands into my pants pockets to try to conserve some body heat. Hell might not work on the same physics as Earth, but it can fake it. I wonder if the cold is supposed to be some metaphor about isolation and cruelty to go with the resident Princes, or if it's just that they're both too cheap to heat the place.

Zhune keeps up a sedate chatter as we walk, informing me of dangerous factions to watch out for, bars with decent beer, and the one pawn shop in the Principality that doesn't deal in stolen merchandise, apparently kept inviolate for the sole purpose of letting every other pawn shop in the place feel criminal in contrast. Nothing requires more than token responses from me. By the time the ravine joins up with a wider (if still narrow and rocky) valley, my headache's subsided to a distant ache. Better yet, I'm no longer in a homicidal mood. While there are some Principalities where the best way to make a good first impression is by killing someone, this probably isn't one.

"We'll grab a beer, put in a vessel request for you, and then..." Zhune shrugs, scanning the valley ahead before stepping out into it. I'm not so brash as to not take that hint, and so I stand beside him, waiting for him to judge it's safe by whatever criteria he uses. "Depends on how fast the request gets filled. We can sit around and have more beer until we hear back on that."

"And what if that's weeks? Or months? I'm not sure he's going to be willing to give me another vessel after I lost the last one on..." I realize I can't finish the sentence. "Okay, how _did_ I lose my last vessel? I don't remember anything past getting into the Tether."

"You know how you were all stressed out that the War might still be holding a grudge, and recognize your vessel?"

"Yes?"

"Guess you were right." Zhune strides forward briskly, propelling me along with him. "On the bright side, you brought down most of a floor on the people you were dealing with, so I scored the mark without any problem while they were coping with the sudden loss of structural integrity. That was a nice move."

"Except for the part where I died."

"So it wasn't perfect. Made a nice bang, though." Zhune stops at the edge of a smooth line of stone stretching from one side of the valley to the other, shiny and worn. "Let's wait until they roll back down. I hate dodging boulders."

"They?" I follow the line up to the side of the valley, and see that the line continues up in a smooth arc. Two thirds of the way to the valley's rim, a crowd of damned souls is struggling silently with a boulder twice my height. "Sisyphus reference?"

"I suppose they felt it was obligatory to have one somewhere in Hell. But then someone said, hey, what's the fun in a single man pushing a little boulder?" The Djinn watches the crowd struggling to lift the boulder further up. "I remember one time when a group of them made it to the top."

"What happened then?"

"Swapped them out for another group of souls. They wouldn't be inspired to struggle if they knew getting it up there wouldn't accomplish anything. Of course, Factions is full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Par for the course."

There's a shout from up on the slope, and then another more panicked cry, as the boulder begins to roll back down. I can't step backwards without pulling away from Zhune, and so I stand still, watching the massive rock thunder towards us, souls leaping out of the way on either side.

The boulder whips past, inches away and sending a wave of sweat-tinged wind across us. It climbs nearly as far up on the other slope, then rolls back down again. Zhune snorts. "Figured," he says. "This crowd didn't look competent. Believe me, you don't want to be in the path of that thing when it comes by."

"I believe you." I'd forgotten how petty Hell could be. Some demon set this up centuries ago for a moment's amusement, and the damned have kept it up ever since, for the occasional interest of someone passing by. Maybe it's a better job that being dropped in lakes of eternal fire. But it's such a waste of potential manpower.

This is probably not a time to start pondering the implications of Marxist theory as applied to the population of Hell. I never found Marxist literary analysis interesting, anyway. We wait until the boulder's finally lost its momentum, and walk past as the crowd of souls, some of them partially crushed, gather to start the pushing again.

"Stygia's not a bad place to live, once you get used to the quirks," Zhune tells me, as he sets us on a path up the side of the valley. The incline is steep enough--no switchbacks on this trail--that he has to let go of me to climb. "Now, Hades, that's a miserable place to live, even if you know all the rules. And I find Shal-Mari too noisy, with Perdition just as bad. Everyone's trying to sell you something." He offers me a hand to help me over a part of the trail so steep my wings spread to help me keep my balance. They're not so much helping as throwing me off. I'm not accustomed to my celestial form anymore. "But Stygia's quiet. If you don't align with anyone, no way to get betrayed. Not bad at all."

I haul myself up. I'm beginning to notice how much easier physical work is in Hell than on the corporeal. I'm tied more closely to this realm, with more Forces making it feel familiar and right. Still not sure if I'd want to stay here for long. Earth has more options, fewer demons, humans who aren't self-damned yet. And I've yet to find a place in Hell that can serve a good set of barbecued ribs. "Except we're both aligned with Theft, which is, in a sense, a faction. Isn't it?"

"There is that. But it's not quite the same thing. No more than being bound to Factions makes all _those_ demons work as one group." Zhune kicks a loose piece of rock off the trail, sending it clattering down below us. "Keep to yourself, don't carry anything too valuable, and people will leave you alone."

It does sound nice, for a moment. I could live with being left alone. Except my dissonance condition means I can't settle anywhere, and my Prince is liable to tell me to do something specific, and there's always someone to whom doing what it likes means antagonizing people at random. "So what's the catch?"

Zhune stops at a fork in the trail, and I realize that for all his projected confidence, he's not completely certain of which way to go. This from someone who's been a Servitor of Theft for centuries? I hope we get back to Earth soon. "There you go," he says, moving down the right fork. "Stressing about things again."

"It's what keeps me alive."

"No, your smarts and ability to plan ahead keep you alive. Stressing just makes you bitchy." Zhune brightens as we reach the crest of the valley's edge. "Here we go. They do a decent beer up there." The village he points out huddles further up the slope of the mountain we're facing, trying to hide between two outcroppings of rock.

"Looks like it's expecting a vampire attack."

Zhune gives the village a longer look. "It does have a sort of Transylvanian tone, doesn't it? You can't buy the quaint authentic atmosphere like that."

"Because no one would pay for it." I follow him along the gentler slope of the road to the village, far too grateful that he's not holding onto me. The implication that I might bolt or fall down if not guided annoys me. "So how do we put in the vessel request?" I can deal with paperwork. A few years of working in an architectural firm, and I have more experience than anyone could ever want in working through red tape to get anything done. Most building permits require triplicate filing.

"Watch and learn," Zhune says, smirking, and refuses to explain any further all the way up to the village.

Up close, the place does look prepared for a vampire attack, between the barred windows and lack of people on the streets. Even the ubiquitous demonlings lurk in dark corners here, of which there are many. The style of buildings suggests they were designed to provide as many dark corners for lurking as possible; I can't think of any other explanation for they're arranged. Has no one here ever heard of right angles? I realize that open floor plans are impractical on this terrain, but neither is a cottage built with five split levels and a tilted covered balcony the definition of practicality in housing design.

"Haven't been here in a few years," Zhune says, "but these places don't change much." He yanks open a door to the largest building in the town.

A wave of noise surges out of the door. I can't see anything inside from this side of the Djinn, but it sounds mostly like people shouting, and a few instances of things breaking. Zhune closes the door again. "On the other hand," he says, "I know of another place with good beer. Not too far from here. We could go there instead."

"Good soundproofing."

"Mm. Yes." A flicker of irritation crosses Zhune's face. He likes to play imperturbable and suave, but he can't always keep the mask up. I enjoy catching the moments when the cracks appear. It makes up for being the junior member in our partnership. "No matter. There's a bar underground that we can reach from a tunnel up the road. You ought to get a chance to see what most of Stygia looks like. The aboveground areas are mostly window dressing."

"Window dressing, am I?" We both look up, to see the Impudite hanging out of a window three stories up. She's buxom and bright red, wearing a stained apron over some flouncy dress. "Zhune! Long time no see! Come in and I'll get you a drink. Abandon me now and I'll never forgive you."

"You never forgave me for last time," Zhune calls back up, and grins. "Can we get in through the back without getting mauled?"

"What, you're scared of this lot? It's just another squabble in the Philosopher's Debating Club. Couldn't hurt an imp, though they do a number on the furniture. I'll meet you at the back." She pulls inside, and the bars over the window slam closed before the shutters do.

The back door smells of blood, and enters on a different level than the front door, but it's quiet. Zhune drags me into the kitchen when I try to make out an old inscription on the doorframe. "Teef, baby, what happened to the quiet bar with a dozen dark corners? This is the kitchen. There aren't any dark corners. It's not the same."

The Impudite appears from a staircase, making her way around tight-packed kitchen equipment towards us. Zhune drags me to the one table in the kitchen to sit, and I'm about thirty seconds away from doing something about that when he lets go of me to slouch comfortably in his chair. Djinn.

"What happened," Teef says, yanking open a crate that exhales a plume of dry ice smoke, "is that the Philosopher's Debating Club split off from the Philosopher's Debating Society, and needed to find a new bar. I was the lucky girl. Lager or stout?"

"Stout," Zhune and I say together.

The Impudite brings us two bottles, and drops down into another chair at the table with a third for herself. "The results were predictable. But they only meet every two weeks, and they pay for what they break, so why should I care? Business was lousy."

"That's what I liked about this place," Zhune says, shaking his head. He snaps the cap off his beer, while I resonate the cap on mine into a fine metallic dust. "Out of the way, no business, so it was quiet when I needed a little peace."

Teef rolls her eyes. "A little peace? If that's what you call the fights _you_ used to get into. You still owe me for that staircase. I had to get to the third floor by rope ladder for a month." She throws back a chug of beer, turning the bottle nearly vertical in the process. "Anyway," she says, slamming the bottle back down on the table, "who's your friend?"

"Partner," Zhune says mildly, though it's enough to make the Impudite blink and examine me more closely. "Teef, meet Leo. He's smarter than you are, but low on experience. That's where I come in."

"You're stuck babysitting again? Hope it goes better than last time." Teef smiles toothily at me, then belches. "'scuse me. Good luck and all that. Are you here for the beer and company, or did you want anything more?"

"Pen and paper, if you have it," Zhune says.

Teef finishes off her beer in a single drawn-out chug, then tosses the bottle over her shoulder to let it smash on the ground. "Can do, darling. If you run out of beer, there's more in the box." She sways off to the stairs, humming some tune I can't identify.

I wait until she's out of sight. "Better than last time?"

"That one," Zhune says, "was stupid. You're not."

"I'd appreciate the details."

Zhune slouches further back in his chair, bottle in one hand, and gives me an amused look. "She was a Calabite. Cute kid, eager to get to business, really gung-ho about the chance to go corporeal. She was, alas, not dreadfully bright. Probably would've done better in a Word that wants things blown up, instead of Theft. She came to a messy end, and it was a touch embarrassing, but what am I supposed to do when she jumps celestial against angels? Get myself shredded too? She could pack a good punch, but couldn't dodge worth shit. You do the math."

The beer isn't great, but it's better than what I've been able to find in Hell before. "Why are so many of my Band idiots?"

"Look on the bright side. It means people underestimate you. That can be an advantage." Zhune's eyes are very sharp for a moment. "So long as your own people know what you can do, let the rest of the world be mistaken."

"See, I used to hold this position," I say, and do some slouching of my own. "But after this many years of having people assume I'm a drooling idiot with no self-control because of my Band, it gets old."

"If people working with you thought that, they were the idiots," Zhune says. "As is anyone who misuses a resource that badly. As for anyone you're not working with, why do you care?"

I don't have any good answer to that. There's no good reason to care what other demons think. It's not like I don't take advantage of the attitude; showing someone who underestimated me that they shouldn't have is one of the biggest thrills I can get without the use of explosives.

But I only enjoy showing up the people who underestimate me because I'm annoyed that they did so in the first place.

It's not something I want to think about deeply right now. I'm saved from an awkward silence by the reappearance of the Impudite, waving a copper pen and stack of paper. "The good stationery, even," Teef says triumphantly, and drops it in front of Zhune. I get the feeling that I'm not going to rate much attention anywhere I follow this Djinn, whatever he chooses to call the relationship. It's a nasty feeling, like sliding backwards, to think of where I was a year after I was made, as new to Fire then as I am to Theft now. I have no contacts, no information, nothing but a scattering of pseudonyms and vessel faces from meetings on the corporeal.

I need to start making friends, or I'm going to be screwed as soon as Zhune gets pulled to babysit some other new Magpie.

"Watch and learn," the Djinn says, and picks up the pen. He has good handwriting, every glyph picture-perfect. I should expect no less of a Djinn. As far as I can tell, reading over his shoulder, it's only a straightforward request for a replacement vessel on my behalf. "Sign here," he adds, when he gets to the end, and I add my own mark to the bottom of the paper.

"So this is the clever bit? Writing to ask?"

"Of course not." He's gone smug again. He folds the sheet of paper carefully in thirds, prints the sigil of our Prince on the outside. Then it's tucked away into an inner pocket of his jacket. "Have you ever tried sending low-priority information directly to a Prince? That would take months to get to the top of the queue. The Boss isn't fond of paperwork." Zhune pauses, and looks at me.

I run through setup to find the expected answer, as Teef moves off to deal with a crash from the main room. "So you wander by some place where a fellow Servitor of Theft picks your pocket, just out of habit, and comes up with a letter addressed to his Prince. At which point he has no idea if he's intercepted important correspondence or not. He can't give it back to you, so the only safe course of action is to make sure it gets to the right person as quickly as he can. Possibly by repeating the same trick, thus getting the matter out of his hands, until someone nervous enough to deliver it personally or sufficiently high-ranking to do so as a matter of course gets the message. Haphazard, but faster than trying to send it through standard channels."

Zhune grins. "This is Theft, not the Game. We don't _do_ paperwork."

"So what happens if someone who doesn't understand the process"--I almost said "the game", but it seemed unwise given the audience--"grabs the letter?"

"Well." Zhune picks up his beer, and taps the bottle against mine. "No system is perfect."


	2. In Which Progress Is Finally Made

The Impudite across the table has been talking for ten minutes straight, and I'm out of beer. I consider my empty bottle, and wonder if it's worth annoying Teef by killing this twit. This is what happens when Zhune abandons the table: I end up cornered by amateur philosophers with strong opinions. I hate to think of what the place will be like when the rest of the club shows up. Apparently the Philosophers Debating Club split into two groups, and now the Society of Debating Philosophers splinter group is meeting here on the off weeks. I spent up all the good cheer of finding a replacement jacket listening to this ramble.

"Nietzsche," I interrupt finally, because it's either interruption or seeing if I can make this Impudite's head explode, "is over-rated. I'm not denying that he had some insightful commentary here and there, and the man knew how to turn a phrase, but his work is outdated and abused to the point of being near meaningless."

The Impudite glowers at me, running a hand through his fluffy green mini-mohawk. Either Stygia has weird fashion trends, or someone's been telling this kid weird stories about what he looks good in. "That a philosophy was expressed at some point in the past doesn't make it outdated," he says, with an indignant sniff. "It's not like technology. Or do you think Plato is outdated too?"

"I certainly don't believe in Platonic ideals, if that's what you're asking. If I have to choose from all the dead Greek philosophers, I'll go with Aristotle. He had a more entertaining style of lecture." One I was introduced to at a young age, by the Djinn responsible for beating some sense into a crowd of promising Fire Servitors. He could set up a series of leading questions, and then let us be smug about choosing the correct and obvious conclusion until we were ready to learn how to apply those thought patterns to real problems. "Besides, anyone who argues for oral over written tradition being superior is smoking something. You'd think someone who had such a low opinion of humanity's ability to reach perfection would take that premise to its logical conclusion on the issue of imperfect memories."

"Oh, _honestly_. So who would you call a reputable philosopher?" the Impudite grumbles. He folds his arms across his chest, and tries to sneer down at me, which he's only able to do because I'm slouching low in my chair. It would seem he'd hoped the Calabite in the corner would be dazzled by his learning and argument techniques. I heard better in my Intro to Philosophy class, and that was freshmen.

I give the question a moment's thought, both to consider what answer would annoy him most and to try to think of a few philosophers I can remember well enough to argue about. I've never more than dabbled in the subject. "Hobbes."

"A total pessimist."

"But _right_ about it."

"How can you compare him to Nietzsche?" demands the Impudite, drawing himself up straighter and taller.

Zhune's suddenly there, looming over the table. Suavely, but it's definitely a loom. "Who?" he asks.

"Nietzsche," the Impudite repeats. "The greatest philosopher who--oh, why am I even _trying_." He shoves his chair out, and stomps away from the table, muttering, "Philistines."

"Thanks for the rescue," I say to Zhune, who knows full who Nietzsche is, and for all I know met the man.

"And the beer," Zhune says, setting a fresh bottle in front of me. "You looked like you needed saving. You should know better than to get into conversations with these people."

"He doesn't know his Nietzsche from his Nibelung," I say, and dissolve the bottle cap. "He's read four snappy quotations and thinks he can argue an entire philosophical position from those points."

"So let him. It's he who looks the fool when others hear him. Correcting him isn't your problem unless you make it so." The Djinn yawns, kicking his feet up on another chair. For an instant I can see sharper teeth inside his mouth, a glinting eye deep inside. Then his jaw snaps shut, and it's only his vessel-form again. I look down at my bottle until my eyes have stopped crossing. Usually I ignore the double images, but I don't want to look at Zhune's real appearance.

A flicker of movement in the dark corner we're sitting in, near the rafters. I look up, and catch sight of a figure slithering out of sight under the cover of a beam of wood. Probably a proto-Magpie trying to practice its sneaking skills. "Not bad on keeping quiet," I say to the ceiling, "but you could use work on not being seen. You'd be better off keeping still in a corner that dark, rather than moving and drawing more attention while getting out of sight."

A little black Balseraph head pokes out from behind the rafter. "Does this mean it's too late to hide the message in your pocket?" it asks plaintively.

"Afraid so. You might as well come down and deliver it in person."

The Balseraph sighs, and then drops onto the center of the table, landing in a coil that leaves it bouncing like a spring. It's the smallest Balseraph I've ever seen, smaller than some unfledged gremlins, with wide quicksilver eyes and sleek black scales. A few more Forces, and I'd think it gorgeous: at this size, it's merely adorable and waifish. "I was going to stick it in a sandwich," it says woefully, "but you never ordered one."

"That's the problem with not having a fallback plan," I say, and put out a hand for the message. The paper I'm handed is the one Zhune sent out a week ago, refolded a few different ways and bearing what look like tooth marks on one corner. I flip it open while the Balseraph makes big eyes at me. The interior's the same, except that a brief note has been scrawled across the paper perpendicular to what Zhune wrote.

_Got a job for you. Have Zhune take you to where I last met him. Make it snappy._

There's no signature. The message doesn't need one. I hand it over to Zhune, and smile toothily at the little Serpent. "So you're on messenger service?"

"Got it from an imp who got it from a Shedite who got it from I don't know who," the Balseraph says, pulling itself up straighter. Its wings fan out to both sides, trying to make it look larger and more imposing. "But _I_ actually delivered it. I am competent! And sneaky!" I recognize the tone of those last two declarations: a Balseraph resonating itself into believing something. The baby Bal does look confident now, arrogant from its vantage point on the table and full of barely contained readiness to tackle any problem.

"Good work," I say, because competence should be encouraged. The Balseraph looks abruptly flustered at the compliment, coiling down lower as it beams up at me. "And now that you've delivered it, I have to run, so you can have the rest of my beer." I slide the bottle over to the kid. "Consider it payment for a job well done."

"Oooo," it says, and then quickly, "I earned that, I really did!"

"That you did." I wave as I follow Zhune towards the door. The Balseraph waves a wing back at me, gathering the bottle to itself with two others, all its silver eyes bright.

Zhune chuckles once we're out in the cold wind again. "You _do_ have a thing for Balseraphs. I thought you were only kidding."

"They're cute." And I know full well how useful it can be to have a few weak, inconspicuous allies who think I'm amazing. Zhune is dangerous at a glance, but no one ever expected Katherine to be the one with the gun.

It's a stupid, sudden pang, to think of her. She's off terrorizing angels now, as safe as I could make her and no longer my business. But I liked having someone around who counted on me, let me be in charge, had a mind of her own but enough sense to do what she was told. Someone selfish and destructive but trustworthy.

"And yet, you didn't stick with the Balseraph Prince," Zhune notes, with an arch look that's nothing but mild teasing. I've seen him go into verbal shredder mode against another Magpie once, but he's never turned that on me, despite occasions when I would have deserved it. Some day I'll have to ask him what he means when he calls me a partner. He's working with an entire system of rules about our relationship that he's never explained to me, and I'm not sure I've worked them out yet.

"Baal. Cute. Somehow, these words do not belong next to each other." It's enough to make Zhune laugh again. "Besides, finding them attractive doesn't mean I want to _work_ for them. Or are you willing to serve anyone you would sleep with?"

"Fair point." Zhune leads the way to a tunnel behind the village, dressed up to look like an abandoned mine shaft. The rusting ore carts seem like overkill on the theme. Within a few minutes we're back into the darkness of the Heart vault, which is probably less a metaphor about secrets and treachery than it's a matter of no one bothering to put in lights. I need to stay close enough to Zhune to hear him breathing if I don't want to run into something or wander down the wrong path.

"Is the labyrinth trend necessary?" I ask, after the third time I've scraped a body part on unexpected rock. "I would argue it's a better challenge if people have to scheme and sneak in well lit straight hallways. Possibly hallways with informative signs."

"Factions likes it this way," Zhune says, guiding me around a pickaxe embedded in the wall. "Our Prince doesn't have any complaints on the matter, so why change what works?"

It's something to consider. Adjusting the Principality would be a demonstration of power, but also an act of aggression. Easier to make small changes where one likes, out of sight, and stay...subtle. I can appreciate subtlety. I can also appreciate large objects going boom, but that's part of being a Calabite. "Surely there's someone around here doing good business in flashlights."

"Lights let other people know you're coming." And that's the last word Zhune has on the subject, turning his attention to figuring out where we're going.

As we walk further down into the mountain, the air turns damp, if no warmer than before. The walls drip, and sounds too irregular to be water burble from other passages. I keep myself entertained with thoughts of flamethrowers, while sticking close enough to Zhune that I run into him every time he stops to consider a turn. At one passageway, yellow eyes glint at us from the shadows. Because the Djinn appears unconcerned, I follow without giving them another look. There's a snickering behind us, but nothing more than that.

"Bless it," Zhune says, as I stumble into him yet again. I'm half ready to apologize when I realize he's not talking about me. "They've blocked off this way since I last came through. Some sort of barricade from one of the territory squabbles. We'll have to go another way."

"Anything I can take out?"

Zhune sighs irritably. Either he's worried about being late to meet our Prince, or he takes traffic flow seriously. "Possibly, but I'm not sure how far back it goes. It'd take too long to find out. I know another way. It's a shortcut."

"A shortcut we didn't go down originally because...?"

"It's loud," Zhune says. "Come on, this way."

We move down even more twisty passages, all alike--I'm expecting a grue to appear at any moment--until I bump into a halted Djinn yet again. "Shortcut's up ahead," he says. "Stay as quiet as you can. If I'd known we were coming this way, I would've borrowed earplugs from Teef."

I nod, knowing he can see better in the dark than I can. He wraps a hand around mine. "We'll do it quickly," he says. "Best way."

We turn another corner, and suddenly the darkness is only a muted gray haze, as if we're in a cavern full of smoke I can't smell or taste. One step in, and I can't see the entrance we came through, can barely make out the blurred shape of Zhune in front of me. He's as silent as ever. The sole of my right boot hits the ground with the tiniest scuff of sound--

It's thunder, by the time it gets back to us, bouncing back and forth through the haze against unseen surfaces, building to a painful crescendo before I've taken another step. I freeze, wincing at the noise. I've been to quieter rock concerts. Zhune tugs urgently on my hand, and so I follow, trying to keep my steps light. I'm not good at this, nor are my boots made for stealth. I keep moving because I have a Prince who'll get testy if I make him wait. I've heard stories of his rages; I don't want to see one. Marvelous incentive. Ten steps in and I can't make out individual echoes, only a painful wall of sound. Thirty steps and I can't hear myself think.

Then I'm stumbling through the dark again, Zhune pulling me, and the noise is behind us, still roaring loud enough to wake zombie souls in Perdition. "That," Zhune says, words clipped short and precise, "is why I don't go that way."

"Yeah," I manage. My head's pounding as badly as when I came out of Trauma, my ears buzzing. I stagger as my foot hits a rock, and then Zhune's holding me up, close and terrifying because I know what's underneath that veneer of vessel-form.

"You okay?"

"I'll be fine." I take a deep breath, and another step that pulls Zhune along with me, no matter that I'm not sure where I'm going. "Okay, I understand your objection to noise."

"I hate that room," Zhune says, matter-of-factly, for all that he seldom expresses more than mild enjoyment or distaste. "But it's an effective shortcut between several places." He adds, after a moment of walking where my steps are nearly steady again, "We don't have to move fast. That saved us an hour of travel."

"I quote, 'Make it snappy.' I'm inclined to do so." I'd rather have this headache than annoy my Prince. Than annoy any Superior I need to speak with in person, to put a finer point on it. How many different Superiors do I need to avoid? All Archangels on general principle, but Judgment and War and Stone and Fire in particular. All other Demon Princes on general principle, but the War and Fire and the Game in particular. I'm something of a bastard, but no more than most demons. How do I end up pissing off so many people? "Besides," I say, because Zhune's still moving slowly, "it's just a headache. Annoying, but no more than that. I imagine it'd be worse if any _loud_ sounds came up in there."

"Got into a fight in that room once," Zhune says, conversationally. "Couldn't hear anything for a week, and it was two months before my hearing got back to normal."

"But at least you won?"

He laughs, and picks up the pace. "No," he says, "I lost. The other demon was already deaf."

The maze of twisty passages, all alike, give way to more populated areas, where light seeps out from behind closed doors and around corners until I can make out where I'm putting my feet. There are signs here and there, ones I can't make out without taking the time to stop and squint. We hear voices a few times, the direction unplaceable with all the echoes. Zhune picks up his pace as the lights grow more common, recognizing whatever landmarks he can find in this mess.

At a door like any other that we've passed, unmarked and uninteresting, Zhune stops. "Ready?" he asks me.

My headache's gone, but my insides are doing flips. I hate walking into the presence of my Prince, no matter who he is. "Sure," I say. I know I'm lying, and so does he, but it's not like making my Prince wait will improve matters.

The Djinn flashes me a smile, then pushes the door open. Unlocked. Fancy that.

The room inside is brighter lit than any I've seen since I got to Stygia, between the mirrors on the walls, the glitter heaped across the floor, and the bright chandeliers dangling from the ceiling. Both of us blink as we step into the light, a coin clinking away from Zhune's foot as he hits a pile of heaped coins and jewelry. A dragon, or dragon-like Balseraph, would look right at home here, curled over a stack and glowering down at us. But instead there are two Impudites sitting on a thick rug, playing some game involving dice, cards, and two stacks of silver bracelets. Impudite and Lilim, I correct, when they look up at us. The Lilim's the smaller of the two, swimming in long blonde hair and so buried under a floppy jacket and spread patchwork skirt I didn't see any green on her until she turned her face towards us. 

"Oo," she says, "petitioners. Do you have an appointment?" She doesn't rise, smiling up at us with white teeth. The Impudite on the other side of the rug watches us quietly, sliding a silver bracelet off the top of the stack near the Lilim, to disappear somewhere inside his own pockets while her back is turned. He has a harmless look I don't trust for an instant. "Pay double if you're caught cheating," she adds.

"I haven't been caught yet," the Impudite responds, as blandly as any Djinn, and the bracelet is back on the top of the stack by the time she bothers to look. "No proof, no conviction."

The Lilim laughs, returning her attention to us. "No appointment, no audience."

Zhune holds out the much-handled sheet of paper to the Lilim. "What time slot does 'snappy' fall under?" he asks.

"Oh." The Lilim sounds disappointed. Snap judgment: the type of person who has acquired a limited amount of power, and takes great pleasure in abusing it. "Go right ahead, then."

"And don't mention Trade," the Impudite adds, in as bland a tone as before. At the Lilim's glare, he only shrugs, and taps his hand of cards against the rug. "Hound, jackal, or roll for crocodiles?"

"Jackal," says the Lilim. As we move on pass them, I hear, "Oh, _bless_ it," and then the clink of a bracelet being moved from one stack to another.

The room has an L-shape to it, and the other door's at the far end around the corner, one tall mirror on the wall between metallic tapestries done up in medieval designs. Zhune hesitates as he reaches for the mirror, only a fractional jerk before his hand lands on it. When he touches the door, his image there changes from the vessel-form to a well-lit display of his true form. I follow him inside, and don't say a damn thing. He didn't comment on my scars.

Valefor lounges in the center of the room, feet propped on a hideous ornate table that's probably worth a fortune to someone with poor taste, flipping through a stack of papers. He already looks annoyed. But when he turns his gaze on us, he smiles, a thin smile that promises explosions if we bring in bad news. "So you finally got here," he says. "It took you long enough."

"I used the scenic route," Zhune says, which I wouldn't dare, but our Prince grins, and flicks a hand out towards chairs. We sit. I'm used to more formality, but casual doesn't mean any less dangerous. This is Valefor's way of saying, I don't need the titles and rituals the others do because I'm confident enough in my position without them. We're his servants, and so we play along. I'd no sooner call him Lord to his face than I'd give Baal a friendly hello.

"What do you think of Stygia?" my Prince asks me, setting the papers aside for a moment. I'd much rather his attention be divided than focused, if I have to be an object of it.

"It's a triumph of atmosphere over function." When I have no idea what answer someone wants, the truth is the best alternative.

"If everything were easy, what fun would that be?" He holds up the paper, which got from Zhune's hand to his at some point without the two of us noticing. I suppose being a show-off goes with my Prince's style of Word-promotion. "Any strong preferences on the new vessel?"

"Something inconspicuous," I say, wondering if I'm going to get another harmless-and-wimpy one. I'd prefer the appearance of my first vessel, but I'm not stupid enough to ask for one former friends and coworkers can recognize.

"That's not entertaining," Valefor says, and he sounds disappointed in a way that must be an affectation. I need to get better at playing this game. He points to Zhune. "You?"

"I've always liked the Bonnie and Clyde style." Zhune's dropped Djinn-neutral for a cheerful tone that I can't figure out the sincerity of.

"Done." Our Prince snaps his fingers, then tosses the paper over his shoulder, a puff of smoke as it disintegrates on the way. I should be grateful that I'm working for a Calabite again. "Next order of business. I have a job that someone's already screwed the pooch on, so you two will have to do it better. Call the deadline two weeks, sooner is better, and keep it quiet. You're heading into a Tether, so don't up the body count enough that the War turns hot." 

"How badly has it been screwed?" Zhune asks, all business now. I don't like the undercurrent of adoration in his voice when he speaks to our Prince. The feeling might be appropriate, if it's real, but letting it show through isn't his style.

"Some Miser is staring at his Heart right now, and I figure Mammon will have a few words with the idiot once he gets out of Trauma. Not," Valefor adds, "that the fool Prince should have tried this with one of his own. They're not professional. You'll have your work cut out for you, because the Tether's on the alert."

"Fun," Zhune says. I'm thinking more along the lines of "challenging" or possibly "Why is our Prince giving us all this information about the job?"

"If you do it right." The promise of what will happen if we don't, resting under that sentence, reassures me. I know where I stand with Princes who threaten harm to me if I don't complete my assignments. Valefor grabs a sheet of paper to toss in our direction. Items of that shape and weight don't throw smoothly, except when a Prince does it. Zhune swipes it out of the air to tuck inside his jacket. "There's a Tether of the Sword that has in its possession two signed contracts by Hellsworn. Deliver them to the listed Tether of Greed, and make sure you get a receipt. Questions?" He barely gives space for theoretical responses before continuing, "Chicago Tether. Move it."

Neither of us wastes any time leaving the room. For all that Zhune spoke to our Prince so comfortably, I can see his face relax once the door has closed behind us. "Some day," he says, "people will learn to call us in first, not after someone else has made the situation worse."

"But then we wouldn't be able to demand the higher prices to make up for their mistakes." Sword Tethers are often churches, though not always. I don't think I've been inside a church since a field trip back in college to examine local architecture. I ponder subtlety around Tethers as we make our way back through the room, trying not to step on anything too expensive.

The Lilim looks up from her game again as we move by. "If you Need to know Tether locations," she offers brightly, "I can offer better prices than anyone outside."

"I already know where the one we want is located," Zhune replies, and her face falls. Scamming the older Servitors must be more difficult than dealing with ones like...me, come to think of it. The Impudite smirks at her, playing with the bracelets in the stack in front of him. It's noticeably higher than it was when we saw it a few minutes ago. "Thank you for the offer."

"Luck and speed," says the Lilim, not sounding particularly sincere about it. The Impudite flicks a wave at us that looks nearly like a salute, attention returning to his cards.

Outside, Zhune pokes me in the shoulder. "You're being quiet."

"Maybe I don't have anything to say."

"No, you're coming up with a clever plan." Which he's right about, if he adds "trying to" in there. "Want to explain it?"

We walk together down the tunnels, now light and wide enough that this doesn't require either of us to stare at the other's back. "I haven't dealt with soul-buying contracts before. Are they usually written in Helltongue or the language of the human doing the selling?"

"Helltongue. You have to admit what the contract is for, if you want it to work, but the monkeys don't have to be able to read it. Otherwise no one would be able to get the illiterate souls."

"Ordinary paper, or artifact paper that can move between Earth and Hell?"

"The latter. You don't want to be stuck with something that can't be produced in the courts down here to prove ownership."

This time I let Zhune work it out. He blinks when he gets it, then chuckles. "Oh, not a bad idea. If we can pull it off, no one can argue the subtlety. But what if someone in the Tether can read Helltongue?"

"It's unlikely. Besides, if they could, are they going to pull out contracts they already have and read through again? And do you think they really made photocopies to compare signatures and make sure nothing has changed?" I grin up at him. "Now, the tricky part--aside from the replacement--is convincing the Greed Tether to give us unsigned contracts at a reasonable price. How well can we bargain with assurance that this way no one will come knocking at their door to get the real ones back?"

"It's not an ideal bargaining position, especially with Greed," Zhune says, "but I'm sure we can come up with something more convincing on the way over." He pulls out the sheet of paper he was given to check the addresses. "Given the two Tethers are in the same city, maybe they'll appreciate the lack of stress. No wonder we're supposed to keep things quiet. They'd start screaming if we pulled the Sword down on them even harder." I'm handed the paper to give the information a look. So the Sword Tether is a Catholic church? There's a shock and a half. "Lucky us that they're inclined to play nicely."

"We're on Greed's good side?" That Word took a heavy downshift well before I was created, and so I've never had dealings with them before.

"We know where the expensive items are. And how to make theirs disappear, if they're unfriendly. They have reason to be polite." Which is a better summary for our relationship with another Word than most I've heard.

Another right turn, and we're no longer in door-pocked tunnels, but a city crammed into the caves so tightly the buildings all look like they're trying to break free of an outgrown fishbowl. The air hisses around us, sound of hundreds of whispered conversations. Flickering lights hang from doorposts and window ledges, while demons and souls scurry back and forth across the open spaces. A small Shedite carrying an assortment of maps oozes in our direction hopefully, then cowers back at Zhune's arch look. "Highest quality," it offers from a few mouths, already retreating into one of the obligatory dark alleys. "Very recently updated!"

"The day I need a map for _this_ place," Zhune says kindly, "is the day guerrilla interior designers from Lust have come in and redone the place with street lamps and straight roads."

"Is that likely to be any time soon?" the Shedite asks.

Zhune only sighs, and moves on. "I can almost forget," he tells me, "how many stupid demons there are in Hell. There's a reason a given demon hasn't been sent to Earth, and that reason is not always that it's so far escaped notice, or that it's needed for duties here."

"One hopes that the young ones will get smarter as they get older," I say, the memory of my Djinn instructor from years back fresh in my mind. Three quarters of my class disappeared during the seven years I spent at that school, and it was never clear who'd been flunked as opposed to who'd been eaten.

"If many of them managed that, we'd have to worry about competition." Zhune aims a casual kick at a demonling in our path that hasn't moved out of the way fast enough, sending it scampering with a high-pitched squeak. "Fortunately, that seems unlikely. Down the street with the banners," he adds, as I nearly miss our next turn.

The banners in question hang between buildings every few feet, tilted at odd angles from being attached to windows on opposite sides of the street that don't line up. I'm not sufficiently current with the local politics to understand what most of the slogans refer to: "No Local Essence Tax" I can parse, but what does someone mean by "Obligatory Dexterity Today"? I have no intention of swapping Princes yet again--three in one lifetime is two more than any demon needs--but if it should somehow happen, I intend to stay far away from Factions.

Zhune begins humming, a song they were overplaying on the radio when I hit Trauma. I realize we're not only walking side by side, we're using the same posture, a faint slouch with both hands in jacket pockets. For an instant, this dark, cramped city I've never been in before feels like home.

Then the moment's gone, as Zhune ducks down an alleyway, the humming cut off. "Henry," he says conversationally, into an empty alley with a massive barred door at the end, "are you off getting drunk again?"

"Hardly." An Impudite steps out of the shadows. It's the most effective implementation of that move I've seen since arriving in Stygia; he appears as suddenly as anyone using one of the Songs of Motion, entirely composed. He's tall and thin, as dust-free and stately as--well, my mind flashes to the vessel of a Seraph of Trade, and that's no comparison I want to linger on. He has a thin smile to match the rest of him. "Zhune, you old bastard. It's been ten years." This demon is also the first person I've seen wearing a tie in Stygia.

"I've been busy." The Djinn steps forward, and then they shake hands as if they're sealing a deal. They may well be; I have too little information to read the social undercurrents. The best I can manage is to keep my head above water. "I have assigned business on Earth. Will Mort object if we use his Tether?"

"Oh _dear_ ," Henry says. "You hadn't heard--well, it _was_ kept a little hushed, not that anything can stay quiet around here. There was a, mm, incident. Mort's not the Seneschal anymore."

"Really." Zhune tucks his hands away again, and I recognize the expression on his face as he shifts to a different plan based on new input. If he couldn't do that easily, I'd never be able to live with him herding me. "You didn't jump at the chance?"

"My dear Zhune," says the Impudite, managing to put a British accent on Helltongue, " _I_ do not trade my potential lifespan for temporary power. I'll become a Seneschal when they remove my Ethereal Forces and replace them with pudding. No, it was Carol who won that prize when Mort was, mm, rendered unable to perform his duties."

"Carol. Really." I gather Zhune does not have a high opinion of the new Seneschal. Picking up on the subtle cues like that is why they pay me the big bucks. "In that case, will Carol object if we use her Tether?"

"Not at all. I'll have someone ring her up to let her know you're coming." Henry waves long fingers towards a wall. An amorphous shadow peels itself away from the rest, and slithers off towards the door. "It may be a few moments, if she's busy with Role-related duties. In the meantime, you can introduce me to your...companion."

Zhune throws an arm behind me, and shoves me forward fast enough that I have to take a step to not trip. "Henry, meet my new partner, Leo. He's the brains of the operation. Leo, meet Henry. Don't cross him or he'll string your guts up with Christmas lights."

"I only did that the once," the Impudite says, "and as Shedim are made of nothing but guts, there was hardly another suitable method of displaying the body." He offers me a hand. I noticed the eyebrow twitch at "partner." At some point, I will ask Zhune about this, and not let him avoid the question. I have enough social sense to shake as indicated, no matter that I get the feeling Henry's checking out my pockets while our eyes meet. He's welcome to any scribbled-on cocktail napkins or empty ammunition cartridges he finds there. "A pleasure to meet you, Leo. Do try to keep Zhune from dropping dead at an inconvenient moment. It's a bad habit of his."

"I'll do what I can." When I pull my hand back from his too-long grip, I find I'm wearing a thin silver ring I wasn't before. I stuff my hands in my pockets, and flick the ring off in there. One more thing to ask Zhune about later.

"A man of few words. I find that a taciturn nature is admirable in the young." Henry smiles more widely before, revealing razor-sharp teeth. "It indicates a rich inner life."

Zhune's hand tenses on my shoulder, for no reason I can determine. The history between these two is both obvious and illegible to me. "How's Junior?" he asks, shifting forward until he's closer to the Impudite than I am. "Finally downstairs?"

"Oh, yes. Carol asked for him. The lad's getting quite the education." Henry moves towards the door, back to us. "If you would be so kind as to not put him through any walls, should you meet him while at the Tether, I would appreciate the consideration. It's no small matter to procure a vessel for children, no matter how much potential they might display."

"You say that as if I might hold a grudge," Zhune says. "I considered the matter settled once he apologized."

"Was it an apology? I couldn't really tell. It's difficult to understand speech when someone's lost his tongue." Henry slides back a bar across the door, then inserts an old-fashioned key into the lock. "As you say, the matter has been settled." He pulls the door open. "A pleasant journey, Zhune and Leo. Don't be strangers."

"Good to see you again, Henry," Zhune says. He leads me forward to the Tether's entrance, with a polite nod to the Impudite.

Henry smiles as we pass by him. I don't trust that look at all.


	3. In Which Not All Gifts Are Appreciated

The air conditioning roars overhead in the manager's office, but it can't cover the smell of unwashed carpet past the door. Junior, in an all-American blond vessel, circles around the edges of the room trying to look smaller than his football-player physique allows. He can't decide which of the two of us is more dangerous. Zhune has hurt him before. I, on the other hand, am the Calabite throwing a temper tantrum.

"This is your fault," I say, in a level voice, because my temper tantrums don't involve shouting. There are, however, the remains of an executive toy in pieces on the desk. " _You_ were the one who said Bonnie and Clyde. Therefore, it's your responsibility."

"I think it's cute," Zhune says, looking me up and down.

"Cute? I asked for inconspicuous!"

"If he wanted you to be inconspicuous, you would be. Apparently he didn't want to. As a second choice, cute isn't bad." Zhune is trying to be conciliatory. It's not working.

"Cute nothing, I'm _female_." Junior twitches as an office plant spills dirt across the carpet, the pot now shards. It's not making me feel better, but it is keeping me from doing something stupid, like throwing my resonance at my partner. It would bounce, and embarrass both of us.

"So no one who knew you will recognize you." Zhune steps back from my glare. Now _that_ makes me feel a little better. "Besides, what's wrong with being female? I've had female vessels. It's not as if you have to wear petticoats. Those are worth raising a fuss over."

"I don't know social cues for this gender. All my experience in dealing with humanity has been from the male perspective. If I use the same body language in this vessel as my previous ones, people will read it wrong." I pull short of resonating the clock sitting on the desk. That looks as if it might be worth something. "And I'm even shorter than before!"

"Think of it as a learning experience," Zhune says. "It'll give you more insight on the social dynamics of the local culture to see them from the other side."

The burst of anger's past, and now I'm only frustrated. If I keep ranting any longer it'll sound like whining. "I'm not used to playing Bond girls."

"Actually," says Junior, "you look too young for a Bond girl. Especially with clothes like that--" He freezes as both of us turn to look at him. "Um," he says. "How about I go get Carol? There's a mirror inside the supplies closet behind you. And a box of clothes on the bottom shelf, if you want to change." He darts from the room before either of us can demand he stays.

"Reminds me of a Habbie I once knew," I say, in a calm voice. Right. Tantrum over, and I can be reasonable about this. Being angry won't get me a different vessel. "What Band is he?"

"Not fledged yet," Zhune tells me, pulling open the closet. He hands me the mirror, then crouches down to sort through the available clothing. "Henry's hoping he'll go Impudite, but I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up Fleshless. He enjoys hurting people too much to Impudite well."

I tilt the mirror up and down, trying to look myself over. The last time I had a new vessel that wasn't an identical replacement for the previous one, I lost an inch and any chance of looking dangerous. This time, I've lost three more inches, and seven years of apparent age. "I'm not sure this vessel looks old enough to drink." I'm wearing artfully ripped jeans, a T-shirt emblazoned with a band name, scuffed sneakers. "Tell me you're finding better clothes in there."

"Depends on how picky you are about bloodstains," Zhune says. He glances up at me. "You can pass for 21, but we'll need to get you one of the good IDs, because the bartenders will check."

"How blatant are the stains?" I tilt the mirror around, find that, as expected, I can't see the back of my head. I hope my haircut isn't as stupid in the back as it looks from the front. Red-brown hair in a sleek bob is not what I'd call inconspicuous. I wonder if it'll less attention-drawing if I cut it short.

"How do you feel about miniskirts?"

I glare down at Zhune, and find he's smirking back at me. "Asshole."

"The selection isn't great." He stands up, pries the mirror out of my hand. "Give it a rest. We'll pick up new clothes on the way there. The deadline's not too tight for shopping."

"I'm not the only one who needs clothes. You look like you escaped an exploding building with two seconds to spare."

Zhune looks down, and blinks. "I'd forgotten. I jumped to my Heart after I dropped off the loot."

"You can't go around looking like that. Action heroes are supposed to be clean and ready to go by the next scene." A brief experiment confirms that my hair is long enough to fall in my eyes if I turn my head too quickly. "Does your Role have room for a younger sister?"

"There aren't any specified." Zhune looks me up and down again, more slowly than before, and grins at my sour look. "I was thinking girlfriend. Romance can explain away all sorts of behavior."

"Little sister. Because if we're going to walk into a Catholic church, it's better if you don't look like a cradle-robber."

Zhune tilts his head. "You could look older with cosmetics."

"Do you know how to apply makeup from this time period effectively? No? Neither do I, and I'm not going to try to learn while stuck in a car. Especially with the way you drive. Little sister."

Zhune waves a hand. This argument will come up later, but so long as I'm this near a destructive fit, he'll be accommodating. "Fine, little sister it is. Leah?"

I turn the name over in my head a few times. It's nothing I would have chosen, but under the circumstances, the best I'm going to do for a pseudonym I can recognize quickly without practice. "It'll do."

"We'll grab you a new ID in South Bend. You remember that Hellsworn--"

"The guy with the eye patch? Sure." I shut up as the door opens to let in Junior, followed by a woman in spotless business wear.

"Zhune," she says, in a voice suggesting she discovered a decapitated mouse in her favorite shoes. "It's been too long. How nice to see you again."

"Charmed as always, Carol." This time, the Djinn doesn't offer to introduce me. The Seneschal doesn't ask, though her gaze takes in various destroyed items across the room before brushing past me. "Was there anything you wanted to discuss before we left? We're in something of a hurry. You know how the deadlines are."

"I know," says the Seneschal, voice tight. I wonder what it's like to be a Magpie from the start, the urge to keep moving built in, and then find yourself tied down to a Tether that sits in the same place for decades before it decays and takes you with it. I also wonder what happened to the previous Seneschal. Henry never specified. "Take any car from the back lot. Try not to hit the others when you leave."

I give her a cocky grin on the way out. It's worth it for the way the corners of her eyes tighten.

Zhune chooses a tan Civic, eight years old and as generic as they come. I slouch against the car while he pops the lock. "Is it just my imagination, or do you have a history with a lot of people?"

"It comes with age," Zhune says, yanking the door open. He slides in, checks behind the sun visor for a key. "You'd think people would learn. Do you want to drive?" 

"You know the way." I grab the front seat, and discover that I have plenty of leg room with this vessel. Hidden benefits to getting a lousy vessel. I bet it'll make cross-country flights easier too, if I ever take one. "So this is what I have to look forward to with advanced age, if I reach it? Plenty of enemies and creepy friends?"

"That sums it up." The Djinn clips a bumper while pulling out of the parking spot. "Henry's not bad, once you get to know him. He has violent tendencies towards people who rip Forces off damned souls in front of him--he takes the loss of Essence-storage capacity personally--but beyond that, it's affectation."

"I still declare him creepy." Now curious on a point, I dig into the pocket of my jeans, and come up with a silver ring. "Son of bitch. Zhune, why did that Impudite pass me an extremely dinky artifact?"

"What?" The Djinn pulls out into traffic while looking towards me instead of the street, and nearly gets us broadsided by an SUV. We ignore the outbreak of honking. "He gave you that?"

"Slipped it on while he was shaking my hand. I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't been checking to see if I still had all my fingers." I turn the ring about, looking for any sort of marking or hint as to its purpose. "I can't figure out if it does anything. Doesn't feel like much, but if it's here on Earth, it must be something. Unless he gave me a useless artifact for the sole purpose of messing with my head."

"I wouldn't put it past him." Zhune grabs the ring, eyes narrowing. "I always knew he should have been a Kobalite--"

"Eyes on the road!"

Zhune swerves out of the way of an oncoming car that didn't expect someone to run a red light three seconds after the change. "Don't stress so much, Leo. I'm not going to hit anything."

"I'm more worried about the reverse." I reach for the ring, but Zhune stuffs it into his far pocket. "So does it do anything?"

"Not that I can tell. I'll ask him about it the next time I see him. He's probably trying to mess with your head. Henry takes some things too personally."

I trace back through recent conversations, and hypothesize. "For example, you taking on a new partner now that he isn't in the position."

"Clever girl."

"If you call me Leah when we're alone, I'm going to _hit_ you."

Zhune chuckles. "Go ahead. You punch like a girl. But I'll call you whatever you want when we're alone, babe." The leer he gives me is so strange to have directed at me I can't work out if I'm annoyed or amused, and by the time I've decided I've lost any chance to ask about this partner thing without making it sound like a big issue. Later.

"First rest stop on the freeway, we're switching off." I tilt the seat back, and prop my feet on the dashboard, shifting around until I can get the position to work at this vessel height. "Remember, the other cars are not our friends. We do not want to meet them, hug them, or bring them into our temporary home."

"Hey, Leo. If I asked nicely, would you wear heels?"

"Only if you do too."

Zhune chuckles, as I close my eyes and go back to working on plans for the upcoming job. "Fair enough."


	4. In Which I Allow Myself To Be Convinced

Inside the motel room, I toss the bags on the floor and head to the bathroom with a pair of scissors. "We could have done this in a gas station restroom, you know." I've spent too much of my life in cheap motel rooms, and they've started giving me flashbacks. In here there aren't any orphans to cajole, angels to irritate, Balseraphs to placate. It still makes me edgy.

"It gets my name out there. I have to remind the Symphony periodically that John Derrick exists, or I'll have to rebuild the Role from scratch." 

A rustling behind me indicates Zhune is working through the bags for his shirt. I'm more concerned with the wide mirror over the sink, which has the new face of me in it. Easy enough for Zhune to be nonchalant about vessel appearance; he has one he likes, and can drop back to the celestial plane to look like that or his own form. I'm stuck looking like this until the next time I hit Trauma, unless I can come up with a really good reason to request a backup vessel. I strip the packaging from the scissors, hold out a length of hair to consider approaches. Doing this without it looking like a hack job will be tricky. "Did we remember to grab a hand mirror?"

"Nope." Zhune shows up behind me in the mirror, though I didn't hear him coming. I've known noisier cats. "If you insist on cutting your hair, I'll do it." He takes the scissors out of my hand, and shakes his head. "Pity, though. It's a nice color."

"That's because our illustrious dark Lord made this vessel to your specifications, not mine." I lean forward over the sink while Zhune looks over my current haircut. "I like brown, if it's on me. No one notices brown. This is red."

"Auburn." Zhune picks up a chunk of hair. "Maybe a pixie cut. That should stay out of your eyes and doesn't need much maintenance. Given how badly you treat your clothing, I'm not giving you a haircut that requires effort."

He begins snipping, and I watch his hands rather than my face in the mirror. "It's not my fault that clothes give up on neatness as soon as I put them on. It comes with the Band."

"Comes with the Band, but you have it worse than some." Zhune frowns over my head. "If you were going to cut your hair, you should have bought a comb and some clips."

"Should I be worried that you know how to cut hair?"

"There are times when your face has been thrown up on television--or, further back, wanted posters--and it's useful to change your appearance quickly. A new haircut, a dye job, and a pair of glasses can fool a remarkable percentage of the population." Chunks of hair hit the counter in front of me as he works. "It's not as noisy as swapping to another vessel."

"Does this mean I could ask you for help dyeing my hair?"

"You could, but I wouldn't help." He tilts my head to get to another angle. "It's a nice shade, and there's no reason to cover it."

"Except if I tried to do it myself, you'd end up giving me a hand just so that I didn't end up with a lousy dye job." I grin at him in the mirror. "Try to convince me it's not the truth."

"Sometimes you're a brat, Leo, you know that? Turn your head, I need to deal with your bangs." I can't see his face in the mirror from this angle, but he sounds more amused than annoyed. "Fortunately, I like you anyway."

"You also like 80s hair bands, Ian Fleming novels, and drunks in tight skirts. So I'm not sure this puts me in good company."

"There's nothing wrong with Ian Fleming novels."

"Except for the writing."

Zhune hmphs, a more Djinnish sound than usual. "Better than entire novels devoted to the marriage prospects of boring young Englishwomen who never leave their villages."

"You only say that because you don't understand the satire in Jane Austen's books." I let him shift my head to another position, hair drifting down past my eyes with each snip. "The James Bond novels are only so popular because they appeal to the male population's juvenile power and sex fantasies."

"This is why demons shouldn't go to college. It ruins you for any interesting literature, in favor of the dull classics."

"The classics aren't dull." I remember my sophomore reading lists. "Not _all_ of them, anyway."

Zhune sets down the scissors, then runs a hand through my hair briskly, sending a cloud of cuttings into the air. "That's the best I can do with the tools available. What do you think?"

I check myself out in the mirror. "I look like a girl. But aside from that, not bad. It doesn't look any worse than a cheap haircut." As opposed to his haircut, which looks like it was done in a place that requires appointments, and possibly a meaningful personal relationship with the stylist. "Goes with the scruffy look, which I'm not escaping. Maybe I'm lucky that grunge never goes completely out of style among the teenage crowd. Fuck. Teenagers. I have no grasp of their current vernacular. I'm going to come across as such a preppie if I try to talk with anyone under 21."

"Take a shower, or you'll be pulling hair out of your shirt all day," Zhune says, wiping down the counter. "Now aren't you glad I got a room?"

I am, so I ignore him and move into the bathroom.

The hot water reminds me that I'm back on the corporeal, where I don't belong but feel more at home. Hell isn't big on the gratuitous luxuries, meaning I haven't had a shower since before Trauma. With the door closed I can forget about work and Word and partner.

Except I can't, because the new vessel is a reminder. That I'm not allowed to make meaningful choices, just choose how to do what I'm told. That I'm likely to get killed again some day. Trauma three times already, at my age? I don't know what will be required of me to justify a new vessel when it happens, or if the memory loss will get worse with each round, or if I'll keep waking up. 

My Discord wants me to stay here on Earth, which I'd be willing to accommodate, except that every time I take on another assignment there are people who disagree.

I suppose, given some vessels I've heard of, this one isn't as bad as it could have been. I have to learn a new style of body language to do my charming, but I have the good looks that will work with it. The change in balance and muscle distribution will take time to get used to; fortunately, I've never been too dependent on my ability to throw a punch. If I'd been given Baywatch breasts I'd still be snarling at Zhune, but I could probably disguise this vessel as male with some work. Well. Androgyny I might be able to manage. Probably not a convincing male without more practice in disguise.

I'm tempted to stand under the unlimited hot water for two hours or until Zhune comes to see if I've managed to drown, whichever comes first. It takes me ten minutes to remind myself that as much as I enjoy pushing at my partner's to feel like I have some control, there's such a thing as being too much of a bastard to a person who has been...patient.

I'd rather be working with Regan. She's less accommodating, but she doesn't sing along with the radio when driving. On the other hand, she's working for a hostile Word and likely to kill me the next time we meet, so as fantasies go it's one of the more unrealistic ones. I grab a towel and go dripping back into the room.

Zhune looks up from a magazine he swiped at the store, though what he finds so fascinating in _Good Housekeeping_ I don't want to know. He's wearing the new pair of pants acquired on the shopping trip, and nothing else. They could put pictures of him sitting on the bed like that in ads for the pants. It makes me feel small and damp and irate. "Where are the bags?" I ask.

"Under the bed." He smiles brightly at me.

"And my clothing has been relocated under the bed for some _excellent_ reason?"

Zhune shrugs. "In my opinion, the potential for you dropping the towel is reason enough."

I should have stayed in the shower. "I'm not going to have sex with you." It takes longer than I'd like, but I manage to claw a bag out from under the bed with one hand while keeping the other around the towel.

"Why not?" Zhune rolls over on his stomach to watch me, close enough that I nearly hit him in the face when I stand up again.

None of my clothing in this bag, only his. "I've only tried it from the male side before."

"So think of it as a learning opportunity."

I struggle to grab the second bag under the bed, sure I look ridiculous from his angle. "And we have a job to do."

"We have two weeks to get this done. If the deadline comes down to a matter of hours, we're already botching our plans."

One more bag, and this time it has the clothes I bought. Nothing too conspicuous in being overly sexy or dowdy, only ordinary T-shirts and jeans. I had to try on six pairs before I could figure out what size I wore; apparently women's clothing marks sizes by throwing darts at a poster of integers. I stand up, and drop the bag on top of Zhune so that I can dig through one-handed. "I forgot to buy underwear. I'll live. Are you going to get dressed or lie around trying to look sexy?"

"Seriously, Leo. Why not?" He moves the bag aside, and sits up to look me in the eyes. Sitting on the bed, he's as tall as I am standing in front of him. "Give me a good reason."

"Why didn't you ask in Stygia? We had time then. I was _male_ then." I find a T-shirt, and begin the process of putting it on one-handed. "Remind me next time we're getting clothing to remember undergarments. This female thing is complicated."

"I'm not interested in having sex with men," Zhune says, so calmly I'm suspicious. He's not treating this like a game. "Nor do I like celestial sex." Which...I can't blame him for, with an true form like the one he has. Only a Shedite would want to deal with a creature that disgusting, and Shedim are not known for getting along with the Stalkers.

"Well, I'm not interested in having sex while I'm female. So there you go." I could retreat to the bathroom to change, but then Zhune could follow me, and I don't think it's wise to run. Running makes people chase you.

"You've never tried. How would you know?" He looks away while I pull my jeans on, and it's such a blatant civility it annoys me further. I don't need my privacy to be granted at someone else's whim. "If it bothers you that much--"

"Look," I say, because it's either talk or make things explode, and his Role might not want to be attached to bills for property damage, "every time I have sex with someone, it ends badly. _Every_ time. Right now, the two of us work together well enough for what we're supposed to do, and I'd rather not fuck that up."

Zhune blinks at me. "Every time?"

"Every. Fucking. Time." He snickers at me, and I throw the bag at him. "No pun intended."

"Seriously? Okay, tell me about it." He shifts over on the bed, giving me room to sprawl and look annoyed if I want. Which, okay, I do, because it's not like there's anyone else I can complain at. "When did you realize this?"

"It was the last time it happened that I figured it out." I drop onto the bed, springs bouncing beneath me, and leave the socks alone for the moment. "I was doing a job for this one Free Lilim, who gave me an introduction to a Calabite arms dealer."

"Fire?"

"No, Lust. But working for Freedom then. She was..." I wonder how to describe it, a Discord that made her beautiful and unearthly in the exact way I needed when I saw it. "She was something. But it turns out she was also getting blackmailed by the Game."

Zhune slides down until we're face to face again, though I'm not looking at him. "This was while you were Renegade?"

"You get the picture. That didn't end well." I pick at a loose thread in the comforter. "Before that was Regan, and you've heard enough about her."

"Two points don't make a trend, Leo."

"Oh, it gets better. Before that and with some overlap is the Habbalite of Fire I worked for during college. She was a Seneschal. She was fond of turning my mind into goo. It's amazing I kept up a decent GPA." I don't want to see how he's looking at me, so I fix my gaze on the hideous paisley comforter. If we have to hole up in motels, I'm going to start insisting on the expensive motels. Ones that have redecorated since the 70s. "Before that was the Habbalite I worked for in Hell. You've seen what she used to do." Not all of it, but the scars on my arms are enough to explain.

Zhune makes a small noise I can't identify. "And before that?"

"There isn't a before that. I got tossed to the first Habbalite thirty seconds after I was made."

He sighs, now. It sounds almost worried. How unsettling, coming from a Djinn. "No one else, then?"

"There was this one girl in college. Human. That was brief." I'd rather not go into it, but I know he'll ask if I suddenly stop talking. It's too late to kick myself for getting onto this subject. "Regan sent her to the ICU, and convinced the girl she'd fallen down the stairs. I took the hint." On one occasion I flirted with someone I wanted Regan to pummel without charging me for it, but that's not quite the same.

"Your ex was vicious, wasn't she?"

"The War. They're like that." I sit up, cross-legged with my hands on my knees, and wonder if those zen relaxation techniques Zhune advocates actually _work_. "That's the lot of them. You can see why I'd be cautious about adding one more to the list."

Zhune remains sprawled across the bed, and says, "It's superstition. You're a demon, so your relationships with other demons are naturally prone to catastrophic endings. The one incident with the human follows accordingly."

I laugh shortly. "So you're saying that the common factor in all my doomed relationships is me."

Zhune gives me a mild look. "Don't try to provoke an argument."

"It complicates things. I'd rather not deal with it."

Zhune moves faster than I can follow, and he's in front of me, hands on my shoulders, face bent down so close I can feel his breath. "Leo? I'm not going to hurt you. We're in a profession with a high fatality rate. We have enemies on both sides of the War and throughout humanity. No matter what happens here, we're both going to end up bleeding and betrayed and backstabbed by people who want us dead. But I will _not_ hurt you. That's the bargain made, when I attune. I get to find you no matter where you go, but I can't hurt you." He's too serious, more than I want to deal with, but then he cracks a smile and adds, "I haven't taken dissonance in centuries. I'm not about to start now."

I snort, and look away from him. "You're forgetting that I could hurt you."

"Could you." Now he's amused. He slides around until he's sitting behind me, arms over my shoulders. "You think you could pull it off? Without worse consequences than you'd be willing to deal with?"

"Oh, sure." I lean against him, and wonder when I started thinking this was a good idea. "You turn your back to me all the time. All I have to do is wait for a confusing moment and take out a load-bearing beam. You'd believe me later if I claimed I was trying to kill someone else, and got you by accident."

Zhune props his chin on the top of my head. "But I'd come right back."

"Well, if we're positing that I was trying to get away from you on a long-term basis, that's different. Once we start bringing in possibilities like selling you out to a local angelic Tether, or running off to another Prince, it's too easy to be an interesting thought exercise."

"So what would you do if you _were_ running to another Prince?" Zhune asks.

"At that point, your opinion of me wouldn't be as important. Let me see." I wonder if he's encouraging this as way for me to vent frustration, or if he just finds it funny. "I'm a decent enough shot that I could take you out with a bullet in the back of the head. At which point I stop by the nearest of our Tethers, and send a message saying you got shot by enemies, so I'm going to ground to lose them. No one expects me to jump back to Hell to wait there, so they'll believe it when I say I need to keep moving. That gives me about five days to get to the Tether of whichever Prince I'm switching to, swear to said Prince, get a new Heart made and your attunement to me removed, and I'm a little disturbed that you're getting turned on by all this."

"I find dangerous sexy," Zhune says. The timbre to his voice is amusement, I recognize that, but there's something more that I'm not as familiar with. I think I can form a solid theory based on evidence at hand. "It sounds like a workable plan, though it depends on finding a Prince willing to take you into service."

"There is that snag. Which means you probably _are_ safe with me. Don't you find leaning on wet hair annoying?"

"It doesn't bother me." His chin slides down along my cheek, turning hot breath on the side of my face. "I think it's cute."

I jump at a bite on my ear. "Zhune, did you get a motel room just to have sex with me?"

"Maybe."

"Maybe?"

"Maybe."

"That's not an answer."

"Is too. Just not the one you wanted." He reaches down to unbutton my jeans, one arm wrapped around me so loosely I could pull free if I tried. He could rip a door off its hinges with one hand, but if I pull away, he'll let me. I think. Not a hypothesis I'm prepared to test.

"I just put those on, Zhune."

"And now I'm taking them off again."

"Without so much as a movie and dinner."

Zhune chuckles against my neck, while working my jeans down my thighs. "You don't need to eat. And you're no fun to take to movies, because you spend three hours afterward dissecting the plot, characters, and themes." He pulls me up with one arm to give him enough room to get the pants off.

"It's the principle of the thing." I duck out from under his arm, and don't get far before he's tipped me over onto my back. "Stop pushing me around, Zhune."

"Then stop moving." The Djinn sits down on my legs to emphasize his point. "Tell you what. Later tonight, I'll buy you a few beers."

"You'll spend as much money on me as one of your bar conquests? I'm flattered." I lean back on my elbows. "Or more, given I'm not starting off drunk. Then we have to take into account my higher alcohol tolerance, and what level of intoxication you're willing to pay for."

"You never shut up, do you?"

"You're just now working this out? Regan threatened to buy a ball gag if I didn't shut up during sex. Of course, I would've just resonated it away."

"I'm beginning to sympathize with her." Zhune yanks my shirt off in one motion, throwing me off balance and down on my back. "But you're right. I should have known what I was getting into." Then he's up in my face again, I wish he'd move slower when he does that because it makes me twitch, and he has a toothy smile I recognize. It's not unlike one I use. "Did I mention you're cute?"

"It's just the vessel," I say, except I only get two words in before there's a tongue in my mouth that I can't speak around effectively, as it's not mine. Zhune's not so aggressive a kisser as Regan, taking his own sweet time checking out my teeth (apparently all in the right place) while I return the inspection (one slightly chipped canine, otherwise unremarkable). 

"Funny," I say, when Zhune breaks off. "That's how Regan used to shut me up too."

He gives me a nip at the top of my neck just under my chin, enough to make me jump. It doesn't hurt; it's only a reminder that it could. "Are you going to keep talking all the way through this?"

"Probably not. I'll switch to inner monologue when I stop getting enough of a response to feel like it's a conversation."

"Ahah," Zhune says, then begins working his way down, a straight line from my neck to collarbone to between my breasts, his hands shifting lower as he goes. The bastard naturally would stop talking as soon as I admitted I needed the conversation. I wish I could stop making mental comparisons to how this worked with Regan. Having a psychotic ex-girlfriend is bad enough without dwelling on her sexual quirks while getting it on with my current partner. I'm not sure why I agreed to this. With a Balseraph, I always know (if after the fact) why I turn agreeable to an idea, but last I checked Djinn couldn't resonate people into being cooperative.

"Stop fidgeting," Zhune says, looking up at me. He's stopped just short of the fluff around my crotch--if he'd prefer that shaved, it's just too damn bad for him--with his hands on my thighs.

"I'm not fidgeting."

"You _are_ fidgeting. I know what I'm doing. Lie still and I'll let you know if I want any input from you."

I can't figure out what to do with my hands. "What, you want me to lie back and think of England?"

"Leo," he says, more testily than usual, "if Jane Austen turns you on that much, by all means, _do so_. But whatever you're thinking of, hold still."

My own giggling sounds weird. My voice is different from what it used to be. "Did you know that there's Jane Austen fan-written porn from her era? About the characters in her books. The family heads to London or something and meets up with a troupe of acrobats. There are illustrations." Zhune's chosen to take his tongue along the inside of my legs, ignoring more obvious targets. I lift my head far enough to tuck my hands underneath, where he can't see them tensing. "Which the professor put on the screen in class during her lecture. That was freshman year. A third of the class couldn't look at the front of the room, but we sure paid attention to that lecture." I shut up. I can recognize nervous babble when I hear it.

"Relax," Zhune says.

"I'm _trying_."

"Ah. Trying very hard to relax. Am I the only one who sees the flaw in this plan?"

I don't dignify that with a response. Zhune gives me a thoughtful look, and then a brisk lick right between the legs. "Twitchy," he says, at my jump. "Try to think zen thoughts, or something."

"Twitchy has kept me alive on more than one occasion."

"Leo. If anyone enters this room with intent to kill you, I swear, I will deal with the matter myself. Maybe you should go back to the Jane Austen thoughts."

Watching him move is weirding me out. I'm stuck in this body, but it's not one I know, and I'm not comfortable staring down it as someone else takes over. I stare up at the ceiling instead, trying not to think about Regan. This is unsuccessful. Balseraphs and Habbalah, the ones that dig their way into my head and stay. I used Regan to push the Habbalah out, and now she's always curled up in the back of my head, the lesser of three evils. No matter how far I let Zhune inside, he can't twist my mind the way they did.

"Relax," Zhune murmurs, his breath cold against my wet skin. Then he's back to work, slick and slow, almost enough to distract me. Regan would have said, stop thinking. She was never happy when I paid attention to anything besides her. Come to think of it, that explains her tendency to threaten me with death. A knife to throat is a marvelous tool for focusing concentration. Sex was another method of grabbing my attention.

My leg jerks under Zhune's hand. "Sorry," he says, not sounding the least bit apologetic, and when he bends in again he's back to tongue and lips, not teeth.

Let me be fair: I went looking for the connection as often as she did, when Regan and I were on equal footing. Sex is too tangled up with power to ever be innocent, but we were in it for the thrill of vessels that responded to the physical connection as much as any dominance games. Regan could talk me into believing what she said, and I could talk her into giving me help when I wanted it, and in bed we were no different from any other college kids getting awkward and sweaty with each other.

My breath catches. I bite off a comment, let the Djinn do what he'd like. Much as I know these actions from the other side, I don't feel this is the time to criticize his technique. Especially when it seems to be working. And maybe this is why I agreed to such a risky course of action, because he's distracting me from things I'd rather not think about. It's not often anything short of immediate peril can manage that. "Hey, Zhune. Given that I'm playing sister to your Role, does that make this kinky?"

"It's not kinky until you start using your resonance," he says, lifting his head to smile lazily at me. I wasn't expecting an answer. "Are you sufficiently entertained, or should I stop?"

"If you stop now, I will kick you in the _face_."

Zhune gives his hands on each of my legs a thoughtful look. "You could try."

"And you were complaining about me talking too much. I'm not the one who claimed to be in charge of doing all the work--" I lose track of my sentence as Zhune slides two fingers inside me, chin propped on his free hand. "Oh. That works."

"It occurs to me," he says, tapping out a light beat inside me, "that sex alone isn't enough to keep you focused. So let's talk. I assume you're still up for conversation?"

"Oh, sure. Doing just fine over here. We could discuss literature." I keep my sentences short to work around the speed of my breathing. The faint smirk suggests I'm not disguising that well.

"Literature talk isn't sexy. Tell me something." A third finger works its way inside me, and I don't know if it's supposed to feel that way. A brand-new vessel, never used, fresh from the original packaging, and I don't know if the beginnings of a burn are what this body type is supposed to feel at this point, or something particular to me.

"What kind of something?" Another short sentence. As if that weren't sign enough of distraction on my part, without anything else. My hands are tucked behind my head, somewhere they can't fidget. I'm going to enjoy this less if Zhune feels obliged to get pushy about what I do with my own body, so I'm controlling the matter myself. Does it count as being pushed around if I choose to do what I would otherwise be forced into?

"Something about you that I don't know," Zhune says.

I've worked for Servitors of an Archangel, usually to trouble agents of Hell. I was a little bit in love with a human on two separate occasions. I've pushed an angel to Fall, and sent another one away because I was afraid she might. "I got marked down on an essay I wrote about a Trollope book on account of being too judgmental," I say, and pull one leg up.

"I thought we weren't going to discuss literature." Zhune shoves the leg back down, not hard enough to annoy me. Much.

"Picky. Okay. Let me think." Seraphim are just as cute as Balseraphs, and less likely to mess with my head. There might still be a Cherub of Judgment attuned to me. I feel guilty when I think about where Regan might be now because of me. Zhune flexes his fingers, and I lose track of what I was going to say again. "The best beer I've ever had came from a Flowers Tether."

"Really." Zhune never sounds shocked. I don't think he can be shocked with anything short of literal electricity. "What were you doing in a Flowers Tether?"

"Not getting killed by the War after going Renegade. And drinking beer. I got smashing drunk, and told a Seraph he was cute, and then I left. I made him promise he wouldn't look for me." I'm not drunk right now, which means I shouldn't be saying this. Never mind. It's not as if he didn't know I ran Renegade the War and Theft.

"I'll bet they were friendly and considerate, and talked up all the benefits of redemption."

"That too. But good beer wasn't enough incentive to go in for brainwashing." My voice can't make it through the sentence in a straight line, taking a little pause halfway through, enough to keep Zhune smug. "They didn't even offer T-shirts."

"What's a redemption offer without a complementary shirt?"

"Exactly my point. It's a flaw in their marketing plan."

"Should've left a note about it in the suggestions box." His fingers have found a rhythm too fast to let me ignore them, too slow to get me where this vessel is trying to go. "If you ever redeemed, which Word would you want to serve?"

"What kind of question is that?" Anyone else, I'd be sure they were collecting the evidence to throw me to the Game. But this is Zhune, and instead I'm only confused, distracted three ways at once.

"It's a hypothetical. I like asking the dangerous questions." The same way he wanted to hear how I could kill him. Every demon has his own kinks. Something to remember for later. When I can think straight.

"Then you answer that one first."

Zhune grins. "Judgment," he says, and pulls his fingers out. "Your turn."

"Judgment? You're kidding me."

He unzips, pulls himself up far enough to begin working his own pants off. Much more expensive than the jeans I bought, those ones. There's no point in my buying expensive clothing. "Can you think of a better place to hide from Theft? And now it's your turn."

I stare up at the ceiling, trying to sort through the angelic Words in my head. "Destiny."

"All the books?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Would've pegged you as Trade. You're too good at talking people into doing things they don't want to." Zhune stretches over me, kneeling over my hips and not quite touching anywhere. "This might be uncomfortable. Are you okay with that?"

"Go for it," I say, because at this point changing my mind would feel like...not like running away, because I'm fine with running. But it would be like saying something to him that I don't want to say right now.

It's not just uncomfortable, it hurts, and it's no pain at all compared to either Habbalite's idea of games, to Regan in a bad mood, to the moment when I realized Abigail sold me out. I liked her, I honestly liked her, but you can't trust a demon further than her dissonance conditions. I don't know if Zhune sees it on my face or feels it. Either way, his face tucks in beside mine, body pressed so close I'm warm up and down in this cheap motel room with the air conditioner running. "You're okay," he says, not quite a question, not slowing down for a moment, but a hand tucks behind my head, another down keeping one of my knees bent back.

"I'm okay." I'm where he wants me to be, no choice in the matter but that I let him do this. Any Lilim can tell you that you're responsible for the choices you made and debts you acquired, no matter how skewed the options were. If I'd said no to Valefor when he offered me a choice between service and death, I wouldn't be here now, with a Djinn whispering words so quiet I can't make out what he's saying, moving between my legs like he belongs there. Maybe he does. It's nearly as much his vessel as mine.

That's what he's saying, back in Helltongue now. Mine.

If I have to belong to someone, partner isn't a bad position to have. Flat on my back with my thoughts trying to move somewhere else, and they keep coming back to here and now, what I can feel. It's different than any other time. I don't know if that's the body I'm wearing or the person I'm with.

And that feels different too, when all my thoughts, the ones I want and the ones I don't, can't hold back this messy physical reality I'm wrapped inside and under and around and if I'm his attuned that he's damned well my Djinn in return. I'm not loud, because I learned long ago to keep my mouth shut under certain circumstances not unlike these.

Zhune makes a pleased sound in my ear, speeds up even as the near-forgotten ache is making itself more known to me again. I bite my tongue and leave him to his own part of things. This time around, it's his game. Maybe the next time I'll get some input on the matter.

He kisses me on the neck when he's done, doesn't sit up or pull out. "What, no commentary?"

"I'm going to need another shower." I wriggle out from under him, making no progress until he chooses to lift his weight off me. "You need one too, unless you want to go out in public looking like that."

Zhune wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. "Do you mind if I join you?"

"It's a motel shower. It's cramped, not very well lit, and there are suspicious stains in the grout."

"I'll take that as a yes."

I pick up the fallen towel on the way to the bathroom. There were only two in there, and now one of us is going to be stuck with a damp towel after the shower. "Don't forget, you owe me beer. _Good_ beer."

"I know a place not far from the Greed Tether," Zhune says, and of course he does. He knows all sorts of things. Next time, I get to ask him questions about his history while he's in an awkward position. "How do you feel about pizza?"

"I'd prefer ribs, but I can be talked into pizza if the beer is good."

And then there's the shower, and conversation, and it's normal again. I could almost stop believing this means something is going to go wrong. Something _always_ goes wrong. It has nothing to do with the sex.


	5. In Which A Simple Matter Becomes Somewhat Complicated

I take a seat on a pew in the nave while Zhune follows the parish secretary off for the interview. He's turned on the charm, notebook and pen at the ready. With any luck, he'll work out the places valuable paperwork would be kept while he's in the office. Meanwhile, I get to sit here and keep an eye out for anyone who looks dangerous, while hoping my partner hasn't disappeared with an unusually subtle Malakite.

That's the problem with the Sword. It drips Malakim the way the Wind does Ofanim, making long-term infiltration of their Tethers nigh impossible. Fortunately, we're not trying long-term. Unfortunately, they already have reason to be suspicious of new visitors. We're taking a risk on direct reconnaissance after a clumsy attempt. (An apology from the Greed Tether for making our work harder would have been appreciated. We settled for two unsigned contracts, after an hour of bargaining that Zhune left me to while he sat in the background looking smug.) I argued for the cautious approach, Zhune argued for speed, and look who won the debate. If I get stabbed to death by an angry blackwing, I'm going to hold this against him.

There's no sign of anyone else in this part of the church. Just me, the light from the stained glass windows, and the creepy crucifix on the far wall. Someone's gone to a great deal of trouble to paint in glossy dripping blood around the nails and thorns. I shift my focus off to the piers, dull compound ones with the obligatory foliage carved on the capitals. No Green Man faces on a church less than a century old. Some day I'll visit England and study buildings using architectural trends that predate my first supervisor. In the meantime, I have the constant grating awareness of an angelic Tether around me to keep me focused.

A rasp to my left marks a confessional door opening. The woman who totters out could be a Malakite, but the way she leans on her walker suggests otherwise. She smiles at me on her slow journey past. I smile back, and try to look like the bright future of Catholicism rather than a disreputable hoodlum.

As the old woman reaches the doors in the back, the confessional opens again, from the other side. The priest who steps out stands tall and thin, elegant in stark black with a white collar. My first guess is Seraph, though I'd buy Malakite. He could probably hide all manner of weapons under robes like that. Some day an Archangel will begin giving his Seraphim short, chubby vessels, and the forces of Hell will reveal half their secrets before they work out what's going on.

He looks over the stretch of pews slowly, as if he's searching for someone in particular. The priest doesn't have the sharp eyes I associate with Seraphim. Maybe he's human. Or maybe my Choir stereotypes are too strict. Whoever he was looking for, he doesn't seem to have found them. When he moves in my direction, slow and stately, it's with nothing more than mild curiosity. Maybe I should have tried harder to look like I was in serious prayer.

"You're not here for the confessional hours?" he asks. I shake my head, considering how best to deal with a Seraph if he is one. "What's on your mind?"

"I was wondering if the Protestant use of the bare cross, compared to the Catholic use of the crucifix, was a direct outgrowth of respective differences in theology, or simply a matter of sect branding with later theological justifications added to make the choice between the two appear more meaningful." Which was only one of the many things I had on my mind, but true.

The priest blinks once. Not the long blink of a Seraph or Balseraph in a vessel with one third the number of eyes they're used to. "And here I was thinking you might have a moral quandary."

"I'm more interested in the architecture. Sorry."

"Would you be the reporter who called ahead about doing an article on the church?"

"No, but I tagged along with him." I lean forward on the back of the pew in front of me, chin on my hands. It's an awkward reach with this vessel size. "He's interviewing the secretary, I think. Do you have to wear that collar all the time?"

"This? Not all the time." The priest touches the white collar around his neck, and smiles. It's a too gentle look for my taste, with a hint of condescension. Or maybe that's only my imagination, from the way his height makes him look down at me. "It would be impractical to shower with this on."

"And here I thought priests weren't allowed to talk about issues as racy as showering." I grin at him askance, and wonder if there's going to be stabbing soon. Swordies are probably unhappy about getting blood on the floors of their churches. "I hear you do a lot of community stuff around here. Saving people from drugs and the like?"

"It's one of our focuses. Why, do you do drugs?"

"Only the legal ones. And if you want to save me from smoking, it's too late. I quit that years ago."

The priest sits down beside me, leaving enough space between the two of us to disallow any hint of impropriety. "Why did you start?"

"Peer pressure." Everyone knows demons of Fire smoke.

"And why did you quit?"

"I decided my peers were idiots." He's asking more questions than I'd like, if he's an angel, but providing excellent cover if anyone else walks in looking for demons. Assuming he's human. "So you're the priest for this place? Or is there more than one?"

"More than one," he says, and offers me a hand. "Father Sebastian."

Do I want to shake the hand of an angel? Not particularly. Can I come up with a graceful way to avoid the gesture? Not on the spur of the moment. I give his hand a quick pump, and say, "Leah Derrick. Don't you find the title of Father vaguely Freudian in its implications?"

"I never put much faith in Freud's works." There's a rumble of disturbance from beyond the altar, where an apse would be if this were a proper medieval cathedral. Here, it's only a decorated wall with wooden doors leading to other rooms. Neither of us glances towards the sound. It's to be expected that a Tether will throw off the sound of someone ascending or descending from time to time. I'll hope that wasn't someone dropping down to have a pointy-ended talk with Zhune. Attempting to flee to one's Heart from inside an angelic Tether isn't advised. The priest studies me, and asks, "Psychology major?"

"Minor." He chuckles, so I grin along as if I meant that to be amusing. "I'll agree he's more relevant as a historical figure and researcher of abnormal psych than as a writer of practical advice."

He leans back, hands on his knees. "Well, Leah, do you think you'll be in the area long enough to attend a mass?"

"I'm not Catholic. I figured that part was obvious by now."

"We don't mind." The priest lowers his voice into a conspiratorial whisper. "They rope off three rows of pews in the back until the service starts, so that people who arrive late can be seated quietly. If you show up five minutes after the hour, you can sit in the back and criticize our quaint religious customs from there."

I turn to look directly at this Father Sebastian, who I'm sure isn't a Seraph, though I'm not ruling out other Choirs yet. "You won't mind a heathen like me in the back row?"

"You can take notes, if it helps you with the sense of detachment from the proceedings." The corners of his eyes crinkle when he smiles, and I revise the man's probable age up ten years. He could pass for thirty, but I suspect he's past forty.

"I might take you up on that." Especially if there's a way to slip out of the back pew during services to visit the restroom, then the offices. A church service should tie up a large percentage of the standard Tether personnel.

One of the two doors on the far wall swings open, loudly enough that both of us look up. The man who steps out is barely older than my vessel's age, with this stupid patch of facial hair--

I realize I've stopped breathing, and look away before the priest can notice. Of course. Walk into a Tether of the Sword that's upping security, and they'll have more angels dropping by, from militant, allied Words. Like, let me guess, War. Hi, Sean. Long time no see. He's not going to like seeing me in the middle of this Tether.

...but unless he resonates me and sees deep down, he's not going to recognize me. Thanks, Valefor. I guess.

"Father Sebastian," the Mercurian says, stopping at the end of the pew. He sounds more perfunctory with the title than polite. "Have a minute?"

"I'm a little busy right now," the priest replies gently. "Can you wait a few?"

Sean nods, barely a glance flickering across me as he examines the nave. I wonder if he's looking for the same person the priest was. "I'm the one who was late. Fair enough that I should wait. I'll be in your office." He strides away, footsteps echoing on the flagstones until he reaches the wood floor of the foyer.

Father Sebastian doesn't quite control a sigh. "My apologies."

"No problem." I stand up, hands in my pockets so as not to give the impression that I want to shake his hand again. "Parishioner with an urgent moral dilemma?"

"Not quite. There was a break-in, and Father Turner decided we should have someone look over our security arrangements."

"He doesn't look old enough to be in charge of lunch line security, much less a church's." And I'm not sure why the Sword, paragons of honor and smiting that they are, would grab someone from War to handle the matter instead of taking care of it themselves. Unless they're grabbing available personnel for a temporary matter--say, hunting down the perpetrators--rather than a long-term security upgrade. Angels scouring the city for thieves is a completely different problem than heightened security here. If the Greed Tether knew about this, no wonder they were willing to deal with us.

"Appearances can be deceiving." The priest is watching me closely enough that I probably look as distracted as I am. Pity I don't know how to blush on cue, or I'd try to pass it off as attraction. "Should I expect you this Sunday?"

"Maybe," I say, and give him a charming smile. It's keyed for a different vessel, but if I come across as overly aggressive in this one, so be it. I have something to think about. "Thanks for humoring me. I'll let you get to your important meeting."

"My pleasure," says Father Sebastian, with a wistful note underneath the phrase. Maybe he is nothing but a mortal man who appreciated a few minutes of talking to someone pretty who he isn't allowed to touch. Or maybe I'm projecting. I can't work out the reactions to this appearance. I need to recalibrate all sorts of social data, on both sides.

I wait for Zhune in the foyer, where I can see the doors behind the altar but move out of sight quickly if necessary. Disturbance signals another Tether use, but no one appears for that one. The concentrated light of Heaven, harmless so long as I'm shielded by this vessel, keeps me edgy. As if the prospect of Malakim, or seeing Sean walk past, weren't enough.

I spend this time trying to figure out what I'll tell Zhune.

He appears with the secretary walking beside him, the two of them talking in the bright, professional tones of people who have only recently met but approve of each other's views so far. I get a grin from him and a disapproving look from her. My clothes have become more wrinkled waiting for him to show. "Sorry to keep you waiting so long," Zhune says, and ruffles my hair in a big brother way. I'm going to have to kick him for that later; being nice enough to help me cut my hair doesn't give him the right to touch it whenever he likes.

"No problem," I chirp, perky enough to set my own teeth on edge. "I got to talk with one of the priests here. Ready to go?"

"Since the pastor isn't in today, I can come back another day for the last interview." Zhune shakes the woman's hand, with one last charming smile. "Thank you again for your time, Mrs. Kerns."

"Any time." She likes him, and who wouldn't? Polite, interested in what she has to say, good-looking, and in a respectable occupation. The church will get a nice fluff piece for some newspaper or magazine out of his visit. It's taking effort to resist rolling my eyes and thus looking even more the part of the bratty teenager.

Zhune tosses me the keys once we're out in the parking lot. "Anything interesting show up?"

"Maybe." I haven't decided what I'll say about Sean. This would be less complicated if Zhune hadn't seen me talking to Sean before. Or if I hadn't named the Mercurian as a hostile former coworker, upon being asked about it. On reflection, I should have thought of the possibility I'd run across Sean again, before I lied to Zhune about him. I was drunk at the time, so not on the top of my game.

"Maybe? As in something maybe interesting showed up, or something interesting maybe showed up?" Zhune tosses his notebook into the back seat after getting into the car, and then waits for me to pull out into the light early afternoon traffic before poking me in the shoulder. "Are you going to elaborate, or are we doing this as pantomime?"

"Maybe as in I saw exactly three people while I was sitting around in the church waiting for you, and we _might_ have a problem." I hit a red light, and realize I don't know where I'm going. "Crash at another motel, or did you have a particular place in mind?"

"Right at the next light. There's a Soldier in the city we can stay with. What kind of possible problem? Do you think the skinny priest was a Seraph?"

"He has the body type for it, but not the mannerisms or manner of speech. So he might be better at hiding it than most, or might be human. I'm not ruling out other Choirs, either, but I'm leaning towards mortal, Aware or otherwise."

"So long as you didn't talk about things he could catch you out on if he _is_ a Seraph, that's no problem." Zhune tilts his seat back, head resting on an arm. "Is that all?"

"No. One little old lady who I can't find a reason to be suspicious of, and then someone I recognized, who didn't recognize me." I can't go into the truth at this point, not without bringing up questions I'm not ready to deal with. Trying to keep a lie going over long periods of time makes me nervous; it's too easy to slip up and drop a piece of information that hints at the truth. "Remember that bar about six months back, where an old coworker showed up to bother me?"

"Vaguely. The college kid with the stupid soul patch?" Zhune frowns at me. "And he's showing up in a Tether of the Sword?"

"Worse yet, he showed up right after the sound of someone dropping down a Tether, and knew the priest."

"Fuck. Swapped sides?"

"That's what I'm thinking." This is a plausible reason for a Mercurian to know me and express strong opinions on my character. "Sean was cracked even when I worked with him, so I'm not that surprised, but it's potentially awkward."

A silence stretches out while the Djinn digests this information. "If he doesn't recognize you," Zhune says, "it shouldn't be an issue. More to the point, it's one angel in the area we both recognize and know the Choir for. What Choir?"

"Mercurian."

"Oh. Double fuck." My partner's not the sort to underestimate angelic resonances.

"I know. I can only assume he didn't get a good enough look into me to pick up anything that he'd recognize, but I can't count on that happening twice." Now, if I had _any_ good excuse for knowing that Sean works for War, I could explain why this means we have to be worried about the Tether getting aggressive in its security rather than defensive. As I can't come up with one, I'll have to keep an eye out for that myself, and count on Zhune's experience to keep him alert.

"Back in that bar, did he pick me out of the crowd?"

"I'm not sure. I don't _think_ he did, but I can't count on it. Especially if he was turned back then."

"We're going to have to work on the assumption that he didn't," Zhune says. "It's a potential problem if he resonates me, but trying to keep both of us out of sight won't get us anywhere. They've had too much time to prepare for a standard break-in." He points to an upcoming light. "Left here. Maybe we should kill him ahead of time."

"Which is going to help us with the part where we keep this quiet and don't start a war with the local Tethers how? He's a Mercurian, not a Malakite. They might take his death personally." And I'm not sure we'd be able to take him without a sniper rifle. "We'd better keep that as a plan B."

"It's easier to apologize for noise with a complete job, than to apologize for a failed job done quietly," Zhune says. "But if he doesn't bother us, we can let him live." He shifts in his seat to look at me directly. "This means you're the better choice to grab the files while I keep people distracted. We don't want the wrong person looking at you."

"I don't have Passage. I can pick a lock, but I'm not sure I can do much about a safe." Besides resonate it into pieces, which is an option, but does rather reduce the subtlety of the theft.

"The contracts might be in the file cabinets in the office. If they have a safe, I didn't see it." Zhune points me to another turn, and adds, "The office I saw, that is. I only got a brief view of another office. But you can start with the file cabinets and work your way down."

"And what if I run out of time? I'm supposedly in the bathroom while I'm riffling through their paperwork."

"You're female. You can get away with disappearing into a bathroom for half an hour."

He has a point. "I hope the priest giving the sermon is long-winded. They'll look closely at both of us if I'm found in places I shouldn't be. Though if I get fair warning of the service breaking up before I can get out of sight, there's always Ethereal Form." The Song's saved me from damage on more than one occasion. "At which point, as soon as it wears off, they _know_ someone was sneaking around there. But they might not be sure who. Are we going to have any chance of human cover, or does everyone else who attends this church live locally?"

"The secretary claims they regularly have visitors, and that the most popular masses are packed. She may have exaggerated for effect, but so long as you're not standing in sight when the Song wears off, it should be enough to raise doubt." Zhune smiles lazily, pulling his notebook off the back seat. "People are so willing to give out information to journalists. Did you know that they're installing a better alarm system early next week? But the pastor of the church turned down suggestions for security cameras, because he felt it would harm the church's atmosphere as a place of sanctuary and refuge."

"How charming. I don't suppose you picked up on any other potential angels during the interview?"

Zhune shakes his head. "The church staff is too large. For all we know, the Seneschal could be the parish financial secretary, and no one else more than a Soldier. That Mercurian aside."

"From the look of Sean... I wouldn't say he's playing a priest. He's doing security."

"A Mercurian?" Okay, so the Djinn isn't aware of some of the dangers of angels. "What's he going to do, cuddle someone to death?"

"They're not all Flowers Mercurians. Sean put my ex-girlfriend--through a wall once," I say, hastily editing out "into Trauma" on the fly. "And she was a Balseraph of the War. If he has reason to believe either of us is a demon, he _will_ try to kill us." I hope. It's going to be harder to explain if he starts talking to me.

"I'm not easy to kill," Zhune says. "Driveway up on the right, past the red mailbox."

The house we stop at has seen better days; the walls could use a paint job, and the front porch steps are overgrown with weeds. It's a cookie-cutter box of a house, without a hint of originality or style. Zhune leads the way around back to a yard that hasn't seen a lawnmower since spring came. "Your turn to pick the lock."

"You could do it faster."

"But you need the practice. And we're not in a hurry." Zhune takes the bag I'm carrying, and waits until I roll my eyes and take a look at the lock. "Need picks?" he adds, right as I realize I don't have any.

"No, I'll just use this rock. Yes, I could use a set. Mine went down in my last vessel." The tools he passes me are too shiny to be my old ones, though they're from the same manufacturer. I give a window a quick once-over for signs of an alarm system, then get to work on the back door. "I don't make you learn how to read blueprints, so I don't see why I have to practice picking locks. There's nothing wrong with specialization."

Zhune leans against the doorframe, watching me work. He does take care to not get in my light. "Reading blueprints is something that can be done at leisure, and while consulting references as needed. Lockpicking frequently needs to be done rapidly, under tense situations. Besides, I can read a blueprint."   
"Quote, does that symbol mean 'door', unquote."

"Didn't say I could read them _well_." The lock clicks open, and the knob turns in my hand. "There you go. How are you feeling about the plan, given the new information?"

I step into a dark kitchen, wrinkle my nose at the smell of unwashed dishes piled high in the sink. I may have lived like a slob, but my apartment never stank. "There are still too many gaps for me to feel comfortable with it, but no better idea has come to mind. It's simple, which I admire. Simple means fewer things can go wrong, and it's easier to recover when they do." I find nothing better than Bud Lite beer in the fridge. "Canned beer? We need to talk to this guy."

"There's an Impudite who sweeps through here on a regular basis who drinks that piss," Zhune tells me, leaning over my shoulder to grab one of the cans I've decided against trying. "She's probably stocking to his specifications. I haven't been over in two years, so I can't hold it against her."

"And you're...drinking that beer."

"Better than nothing," Zhune says, shrugging. I would disagree, but it's his taste buds he's about to offend. "Want to see if she has cable?"

"I'm not in the mood. So you haven't come up with any good reasons to change the basic plan?" The living room turns out to be as much of a disaster area as the kitchen. I shove junk off the couch and onto the floor until there's enough room for me to stretch out with my feet propped on the arm. There's a stain beneath me that I don't want to identify. "Which I note, for the record, I'm still not happy with. There's such a thing as too simple."

"It's straightforward. You like straightforward." Zhune takes the far end of the couch, then pushes me up to move underneath until my head's resting on his leg. "Besides, I've seen the plans you come up with when you decide we need a complicated approach. Do you remember the time we had to wait until a squad of Malakim had decided the city was clear before we could get back in to grab the target?"

"It worked, didn't it?" Not that I was intending to call _quite_ that many angels into the city. Or any angels. It was supposed to be a distraction for the local authorities, not the Heavenly ones. Live and learn.

"Do you like dodging Malakim? I don't." The Djinn plays with my hair, even now that it's cut short. "So we play this one simple and quiet, until someone is less annoyed about how the previous job ended."

"Stop messing with my hair. I'm not arguing against simple and quiet, I'm arguing against the lack of a good backup plan. If I can't find the contracts and get out clean, we can try again next Sunday, but we'll run into new security."

"It's nice hair. If you aren't going to appreciate it, I am. None of the threatened security measures are something we can't deal with."

"And it's my hair, so keep your hands off. The security upgrades we've heard about, sure. What about the parts they're not willing to discuss with journalists who popped up out of nowhere right after an attempt to swipe something from in the Tether?"

"We'll deal with them as they come up. If we don't know, we don't know." I finally win the shoving war against his hand, and Zhune stops messing with my hair. Some day I'm going to need to find a way to get enough Corporeal Forces that it's not _obviously_ him letting me win. "We've looked as closely as we can without giving them good reason to be suspicious. Our best option is to give the first plan a shot." He pokes me on the shoulder. "You're the one who came up with it, remember?"

"I came up with a sort of proto-plan to work from, not a final design." Especially not a final design sufficient to deal with angels searching the city for demons, as opposed to angels sitting around in a church feeling worried.

"If you keep fiddling with it, you'll overcomplicate matters."

"It's not fiddling, it's planning."

"Fiddling." Zhune opens his beer with a hiss. "Don't over-think it."

I sit up, dodging his arm on the way. "If you want to do the planning--"

"Stop it, Leo." He sounds no more put out than usual, though he watches me over his beer pointedly. "Stop trying to make this into some sort of argument. You're upset for half a dozen different reasons, and you keep trying to push it into a fight when there's no reason for it to be."

"I'm not trying to start an argument." This would be more convincing if he weren't right. Again. Damn him. "Do you have any idea how irritating it gets that nothing stresses you out? I have to take up the slack by spending all my time worrying."

"So long as you feel you're pulling your weight in this partnership," Zhune says.

I stand up, and kick more junk out of my way. There's probably a floor somewhere down there, but damned if I can find it. "Would you stop calling it that? I'm not your partner, I'm the person you're supposed to track so that I can't run away, or whatever it is people think I'll do if left untended. It's not a partnership, it's babysitting." For which I look the part, a sulky teenage girl who needs someone else to take charge. "Every time you call me your partner, anyone who knows you gets this look on their face like they're only agreeing to be polite. And I'm getting tired of that, so could you quit it?"

Zhune stands up, wraps an arm around my waist, and drags me back down. Into his lap. "Shut up and listen."

"Also? I'm getting tired of that, as long as I'm mentioning things that are pissing me off."

"Shut up, Leo." In the exact same tone as he was using earlier to comment on the beer, but I haven't gotten this far by being an idiot, so I shut up and let him have a chance to talk. "You're being immature about this, but given your age, I won't hold it against you. You should have said something earlier. Listening?"

"Yeah." I'm sulking. I need to get a vessel that's not so short. No one takes me seriously when I'm short.

Zhune sighs. "I'll try to keep this...straightforward. Yes, I've been set to babysit demons before. It's a way of giving me assistance and some kid experience on the corporeal, and Djinn aren't known for losing their tempers, so it happens a lot."

"You're also good at tracking down people who go darting off in another direction."

"That too. And maybe that's what was intended when we got assigned to each other, though I don't think you need much in the way of babysitting, because you have experience working on your own, and you're not stupid enough to try running anywhere."

"I was once." I should've stayed with the War. I hated it, hated the assignments and the organization and the structure and the orders and how it made me Regan's subordinate, always the outsider and always a step behind her, but I should've stayed. I could have saved myself a lot of trouble.

"And you learned your lesson, didn't you?" Zhune's quiet behind me, as if he's trying to work out what to say. Now that's unsettling. "I do good, solid work on my own. But there aren't many Djinn who serve Theft, and it's because we do good, solid work, where Theft requires more...improv, let's call it. We're not the Wind, but we still need to be able to take on chaos and deal it back out, if we want to keep ahead of everyone who wants us dead."

And this time, when he shuts up, I realize we're back to the old pattern. Offer the pieces, wait for the other person to put them together. "You want someone less predictable to work with you."

"Got it in one, Leo. Look. We haven't tried to kill each other yet, we get the job done, and we have complementary skills. It's a good match. I could wait this out until the Boss trusts you to do work on your own, but that leaves me right back at babysitting some idiot kid again, and I'd rather not." He's not letting go of me any time soon, keeping me pulled back to his chest so close he's breathing in my ear. I wonder what it's like for a Djinn to admit he needs someone else. I can barely do it myself, when pressed. "I'm not dumb, but I know you're smarter than I am. You come up with better plans, the ones I wouldn't think of. The ones people we're up against wouldn't think of. So given the chance, I'd rather have you for a partner."

"You and Henry used to work together like this, didn't you?" My feet don't touch the ground when I'm sitting on his lap. Definitely asking for a taller vessel next time.

"A century or three back. He had more style than you, but got caught up in it too much." The grip around me relaxes. "Always wanted the image to be perfect, even if it made for snags in the actual execution of the plan."

"So what happened to him?"

"Got into a nasty fight in Hell, while trying to do something stylish but stupid, and lost all his Corporeal Forces."

"Ouch." I move over onto the couch beside Zhune, not far enough away to inspire more Djinn clinging. "And you ended up back on babysitting rotation?"

"Exactly." He gives me a narrow look. "Please _try_ not to get killed. I'm not sure I can swing another vessel for you until we've pulled off a series of successful heists, or a single really impressive one."

I grin up at him. "You're just worried that my next vessel won't be as cute."

He holds a thumb and forefinger fractionally apart. "Maybe a little bit."

There's a mess of dirty clothing and electronics at my feet. Somewhere in there, there's probably a television remote. I ask, while digging through (and occasionally resonating an unpleasant bit out of the way rather than touching it), "You do realize I'm not going to wear a miniskirt, right? Not ever?"

"Not even if it's useful?"

" _Ever_."

"I understand," Zhune says graciously. "We all have our limits."


	6. An Interlude, In Which Other People Take New Information Poorly

The priest shut the door, then turned towards the Mercurian. "It would kill you to stop by for a mass once in a while?"

Sean dropped down into the chair in front of the desk, his smile lopsided. "I'm not a Christian, Sebastian."

"Nonsense. You're an angel, therefore you're a Christian. It follows." Father Sebastian took a seat on the other side of the desk, moving an empty soda can into a bin. "All of your excuses about being in the Roman legions or what not aside, we share too many of the same beliefs for you to claim otherwise."

"In that case, let me point out that I'm not Catholic."

"We do offer classes..." The priest laughed at Sean's expression. "I'm joking. Mostly. It's good to see you again, though you could stop by more often. Does work keep you so busy that you can only visit when there's work for you to do?"

"Unfortunately, yes." Sean spread his hands, sincerely apologetic for a moment. "They keep me busy. If it's not a crisis, it's a situation that might turn into a crisis if not addressed, or a team that needs to be led by someone with a more sympathetic view towards humanity, or my little sister needs someone to rant at because she's once again encountered some hard fact of corporeal life. Christ, they barely let me take coffee breaks." He coughed at the priest's look. "It's only an expression. Um. Sorry."

"I imagine you've been under some stress," said the priest, choosing diplomacy after a moment's mental counting. "Nonetheless, thank you for coming by. I don't feel that calling in additional support was necessary. But if we must have someone rampaging about the parish, I trust you'll do it more discreetly than some."

Sean laughed. "Because I'm with War, or because I'm a Mercurian?"

"More the latter, between you and me. They always send us Malakim for security matters. I'm certain there are subtle, cautious, discreet Malakim of the Sword out there. Ones who take care not to react too strongly in the midst of a delicate situation."

"But you've never met one, yeah." A tinny rendition of the Hallelujah Chorus began to play. Sean dug his cell phone out of a pocket, flipped it open, snapped it shut again. "I'll call her back later. The kid needs to learn how to deal with Earth on her own, or she'll get yanked back upstairs for more classes so fast she leaves a puff of white feathers in her wake."

"Let's hope it doesn't come to that." Sebastian checked his watch. "And Dolores is now half an hour late for the meeting. I'm sorry about this, she was supposed to be back before I finished in the confessional, so that there'd be someone to meet you."

"Should I be worried?" Sean asked, voice switching from friendly to professional in an instant. He sat up straight. "If you've been having security problems--"

"No, no, she's upstairs talking with...someone or other. I can't always follow what she's doing in her appointments, and she doesn't always bother to explain." The priest waited until Sean had settled down again before continuing. "As I said, I feel it's an over-reaction. One foiled burglary does not necessarily translate into an assault by the forces of darkness."

"But it might," Sean said. "Especially one so soon after you received those contracts. I'd rather err on the side of caution."

Sebastian shook his head. "I'd rather err on the side of not unsettling our parishioners. Much as Father Turner can be overly dramatic, he does have a point about this church being a sanctuary. I don't want to become one of those places with grates over the stained glass and security cameras in the lobby. It makes people uncomfortable, and less willing to trust their fellow man."

"They have good reason not to trust their fellow man," Sean said dryly, "and you're hearing that from a Friend of Man. But I take your point." He checked his own watch. "She has no time sense at all, does she?"

"None at all." The priest put his elbows on the desk, and leaned forward. "And now you have the look of a man who wants to say something he believes the listener will not want to hear. Spit it out."

"You're not going to like my idea."

"Which is why you're telling me before she appears, so that I can turn it down now."

Sean nodded, took a deep breath. "How about giving the contracts back?" He put up a hand before the protest could be spoken. "Hear me out on this one. Of the two men who signed those contracts, one is dead, and the other is, as I hear it, on his last breaths. At this point, their destiny or fate has been determined. To us, the actual contracts are worthless. The destination of those men's souls was determined when they damned themselves. Consecrating the contracts, or destroying them, or whatever else it was that you intend to do with them, won't change this. But to the demons, those contracts are valuable. It provides you with a bargaining chip."

"You can't be suggesting that we deal with Hell."

"It's a cold war," Sean said. "We deal with Hell explicitly and implicitly ever day. They tried to steal the contracts, not to burn down the church or shoot parishioners. We know about their Tether, but we're not trying to destroy it either. This War is full of compromises, because if we never compromised, we'd rip the Earth apart in the fighting. Trade the contracts back to them, and we've lost nothing."

"Except our honor," said the priest softly.

"You've been spending too much time around Malakim." Sean threw up his hands. "I figured it was worth suggesting. God only knows I shouldn't expect the Sword to budge on matters of principle."

"The Church hasn't lasted so long because of its flexible approach to matters of principle," Sebastian agreed. "Though I'm reminded of another matter you might be interested in."

"I'm all ears." Sean checked his watch again.

"We received word from Judgment that they're sending a triad through here this evening."

The Mercurian looked up. "Oh, now that keeps things fun. Standard circuit?"

"No, they're much too early for that. The message said they were looking for someone specific in the area, but didn't give any information beyond that. A hard to pin down Servitor of Creation in need of an interview, perhaps."

"Great." Sean pressed three fingers to his forehead. "This is exactly who I need waltzing through the neighborhood looking judgmental when I'm trying to smoke out security threats. That's guaranteed to send anyone I could have pressed for information into the shadows before I can get there." He looked up at the priest. "They're not looking for _me_ , are they?"

"Not that they mentioned. Why, have you done something recently Judgment would disapprove of?"

"It's hard to say, with Judgment." Sean waved the issue away irritably. "Thanks for the warning. I'll try to stay out of their way, and hope they do the same for me. As a matter of fact, I'll be happy to get to work right away, if you have any leads for me to follow. Suspicious figures lurking nearby? Sudden appearances of overly friendly people you've never seen before? People you know acting strangely?"

"None of the above, I'm afraid." The priest chose not to make an issue of the angel's opinions on Judgment. "Since the attempt, we've had a young couple and a middle-aged man express interest in joining various classes, one of the teens stop coming to mass against the protests of her parents, a reporter appear to do an article on the church, and the mysterious appearance of a plastic action figure in the baptismal font. Make of that what you will."

"Mm. Nothing that really screams suspicious." Sean laughed shortly. "I think I'll be attending mass after all. If you can point out to me the new parishioners you mentioned, I'll see what I can get off of them. What about the reporter? A piece on the burglary?"

"No, I think it was more of a human interest thing. You could talk to the parish secretary; she's the one answering his questions. I did a search on his name when he called to set up an appointment, and he seems to check out. A few articles came up. Travel pieces, that sort of thing."

"If he comes back again, give me a call and I'll take a look. You know, if I could trust them to keep their swords sheathed, I _would_ ask for a Malakite to lend me a hand. The resonance would be useful."

"We're not a large or strategically-placed Tether," Sebastian said. "There are only so many resources to go around."

"Your Tether has a direct line to the Commander of the Host. You should get as much security as you need." Sean checked his watch one more time. "If Dolores can't get her holy butt down here on time for a meeting, I'm not going to wait for her while Judgment shows up to breathe down my neck. I'm going to take a walk and get a feel for the neighborhood. Back in a few hours."

"Could you pick up dinner for me while you're out? If our secretary means to spend the day talking about parish history, I'll need to work late on the more urgent paperwork."

"Sure. Fried chicken, biscuits, that nasty coleslaw you like, right?" Sean stood up, leaned over the desk for a loose hug. "It is good to see you again. I'm sorry I've been so absent. This week, I'll be so close you'll be sick of me."

"Never."

Sean ran his fingers along the stonework of the walls as he made his way to the church entrance again. He caught the murmur of voices from the secretary's office, but with the door closed had no good line on resonating the people inside. One more lead to look into after the obvious routes had been explored.

In the foyer, he caught sight of a girl standing with her back to him, staring off towards the doors beyond the altar. She slouched against a wall in the usual pose of a disaffected teenager, hands in her pockets. The same one Father Sebastian had been speaking with before, he realized, who'd considered herself a little superior to the priest when he resonated her. The usual rebellious teenager type, sure she was above antiquated concepts like religion and those who followed them.

He was tempted, for a moment, to start a conversation. Humans her age so often held beliefs in response to what they'd been told, either to accept or reject what everyone around them said, rather than working it out for themselves. That's what kept him returning to the college crowd: a chance to argue with humans old enough to think critically, young enough to not be set in their ways.

But he had a job to do, and a triad to dodge. Sean walked quietly out the open door of the church, eyes open for...anything, really, that might be of interest. It was always frustrating to work on a problem with so little evidence to start from.


	7. In Which Small Details Are Accounted For

Zhune passes the woman his pocketknife, since he can't do this part for her himself. "Bloody thumbprint on each," he says.

"This isn't legally binding, is it?" She sounds nervous, which I can't blame her for. Apparently she hasn't had many dealings with demons other than her Impudite boyfriend. She also sounds adoring, thanks to the Djinn of Theft attunement, but I find that part more annoying. It's not that I mind someone else hanging off Zhune so that I can get some space. The rapt focus coming from the woman is more nauseating than Djinn obsession, whole-hearted and entirely false. I should be grateful that attunement doesn't work on celestials.

"You didn't sign your name, so of course not," Zhune says. He pats her on the knee, gathering another adoring smile. "It's only for show."

I turn off the television before the remote dies in my hands. No cable, which means nothing interesting. Nybbas is slacking on the job. Surely there's enough time over at the Media to make entertaining programs for the late afternoon. "I'm going to pick up better beer. And a jacket long enough to hide a file folder stored flat. They'll notice if the contracts suddenly look folded where they hadn't before. Do you have cash handy, or should I take care of that myself while I'm out?"

"Let's not risk attention when we're on a real job," Zhune says. He pulls a handful of crumpled bills out of his wallet. "Should be a few hundred in there. If you swing by Fifth and Main, there's a store on the corner that carries beer imports. Block to the west, there's a vintage place where you can get a decent leather jacket for what you have on you."

"Great." I double-check that I have my new ID, and leave the two of them to their cuddling. We're stuck here until mass tomorrow morning, and I'll have nothing better to do than drink beer. I suppose it could be worse. We could have the Society of Debating Philosophers in here too.


	8. An Interlude, In Which Angels Play Poorly With Others

Sean didn't get back to the church until sunset, rush hour traffic quieted while the commercial strip filled with pedestrians looking for a dinner they didn't have to cook. He'd stayed out longer than he intended. In constructing a picture of the connections in a neighborhood, there was never long enough, always more to see if he dug deeper, resonated more people, saw them interacting in different groups.. But then, he'd only meant to get a feel for the big picture. Time with humans was an addiction of sorts, and one he had to be careful with.

The side door he tried first was unlocked. Sloppy work, doubly so for a place keeping a _closer_ eye on security. He padded down the corridor to the back offices, wondering if there was anyone in the Tether who'd noticed his entrance. Maybe they could find a young Kyriotate who needed time on Earth before taking on human hosts to do surveillance. Dealing with the Sword could be challenging. They had the right idea about most things, but insisted on approaching goals in roundabout ways for small points of honor that couldn't matter.

An office door opened, and a dimpled face poked out. "Oh! Sean! I just missed you." The nun beamed up at him, gesturing him in. "I got back only ten minutes after you'd left. And I thought about following, but no, I said to myself, he ought to have a chance to look around, and after all it _was_ my fault for being late, which of course must have done dreadful things to your schedule, I'm sorry about that, I just don't know where time goes in the Groves. Do come in and meet our other visitors."

"I need to deliver Father Sebastian his lunch," Sean said, waving the bag he carried to make his point. "But I'll be along in a few."

"Of course! They can wait to meet you." The nun gave him a cheery wave, and disappeared back into her office, telling someone he couldn't see, "That was Sean, I was mentioning him to you, a nice boy--" The door closed, and cut off the rest of her words.

Sean held his smile a moment longer. Then shuddered, and continued on to Sebastian's office.

The priest looked up as he entered. "Angelos, the messengers. Do you know, no angels in the scriptures ever appeared bearing fried chicken and biscuits."

"Maybe it was left out of the record. Or maybe Seraphim were the ones bringing the messages. They get all the good press. Some of them don't remember about the human details, like the need to eat." Sean dropped the bag on the desk, and sighed. "Triad appeared, didn't it?"

"And just returned from a trip to arrange a rental car." Sebastian pointed at the Mercurian with a pencil. "Some day, I will get one of you to explain to me what, precisely, War has against Judgment."

"It's a long story, and an old one."

"And one which you'd rather not give to humans, as it troubles people to think that Heaven is not united in perfect harmony." Sebastian snorted. "We're not the fragile creatures your kind makes us out to be. Nor am I so attached to my illusions about God's creatures being perfect, as if seminary weren't enough to cure me of that, that I can't take a sordid story in stride."

"Ask me another time? Right before I have to go play nice with a triad is not a good time for stories about old grudges." Sean watched the priest spread food across his desk. "How can you like coleslaw? Especially _that_ coleslaw? It's nasty."

"You don't understand the joys of shredded cabbage."

"And never will." Sean ran a hand through his hair. "I suppose I have to talk with the triad. Better than having them corner me later. Did you run the idea about trading the contracts back past Dolores?"

"Sister Dolores is of the same opinion as I am on this matter, as you should know."

"It was worth asking." Sean gave a dramatic shudder. "Wish me luck. If they drag me away in handcuffs, it was nice knowing you."

"Don't be such a drama queen," Sebastian said, and waved a spoon at the Mercurian. "Go. Be polite. Surely you, of all the Choirs, can be diplomatic."

Back at the closed door, Sean tried to make out any of the voices beyond. Dolores could be heard easily, but then, the Ofanite's voice could often be heard from half a block away, or further during a recess she was monitoring. None of the others spoke loudly enough to be clear. He rapped on the door, tried to pull his emotions into order in case they had an Elohite in the triad. Polite, professional, _busy_. Not in the mood for more than a brief introduction.

The door popped open, Dolores beaming up at him from so close he had to look directly down to see her. "Sean! Come on in, please. Have a seat, I brought another chair so that there'd be places for everyone, I'm afraid you get the folding chair, but it's not _that_ uncomfortable a folding chair, I made sure we got the sort with a bit of padding because if people are packing the nave for Christmas mass the least we can do is reward their journey with seating that won't distract them from the service, don't you think?" She plopped back down at her place behind the desk, barely visible once she was sitting. Her office in the school had a higher chair, to put her at eye level with visitors. The room was too small to fit in five people comfortably, regardless of the chairs involved.

Sean took a seat, not offering a handshake to any of the three others in the office who studied him so closely. He threw out a quick group resonance, then one for each of them in turn. Know the--well, not the enemy, but not the sort of ally one could count on.

The stocky woman, predictably, was the Cherub. Hakupha, a work-focused angel with nothing that could be called a hobby, unless he counted her fondness for combat practice between assignments. She seemed the most likely to be reasonable of the three, despite the suspicious look she was giving him. Assuming previous encounters with his Wordmates hadn't left her irrevocably biased against War. What he found odd was that she registered as senior among the triad, if fractionally so.

The tall man with a fading bruise across one arm wasn't well-known to the Cherub, and considered himself subordinate to both other members of the triad. Malakite, possibly, by the searching look and then disinterest once resonance results came up clean. His long jacket suggested places to hide weaponry.

And the third was the one with the voice he'd heard most often, though not been able to make out, a young man with sharp green eyes and an odd smile. No name appeared for that one, but the web of personal relationships stretched across half the planet, hundreds of different locations this one could call home as easily as the next when outside of Heaven. "So you must be Sean," said the young man. "You're not Discordant as I can hear it, and you're not dissonant or Joe would be grumpy, so stop looking at us like we're about to put you on trial."

"I wasn't," Sean replied, blandly. "After all, Judgment doesn't put people on trial unless they've done something wrong."

"Or we suspect them of it," said the young man, ticking numbers off on his fingers. "Or they've been accused and a trial is necessary to clear them of the accusations. In any case, we don't bite. Generally. The name's Ruhamah, that's Hakupha, that's Joe, we're pleased to meet you, and we're not here to get in your way. Questions?"

Sean folded his arms. "I'm wondering why there's a triad without a Seraph in the area."

"It isn't any of your business," said the Cherub gruffly. So maybe he was mistaken about who he'd get along with best. "This is a matter unrelated to War--"

"Oh, don't get pissy," Ruhamah said. The power relationship between the two was strange; Sean finally pinpointed it as the Cherub being in charge by virtue of her Choir, and the other--Ofanite, then?--the more experienced of those present. There was genuine affection in there, if he wasn't misreading matters. "He's not shouting at us yet, so we're ahead of most encounters with War."

"There's no reason to fight," said Dolores, in the sort of voice she might use on two of her kindergarten students. "We're all on the same side."

"Exactly." Ruhamah switched positions in his chair, the usual fidgeting of an Ofanite confined in a space too small to walk about without annoying other people. "But I leave the matter of how much of our business we should tell you to Hakupha. Guardian?"

"We are not an investigative triad," the Cherub admitted, her voice clipped. "We're in the area for a retrieval. As such, we brought Servitors of Judgment appropriate to the task at hand. I'm given to understand that you're here on some matter of security. Do you require assistance in this matter?"

Sean suppressed an eye roll. "I don't expect to need help, though as long as you're here, if you can keep an eye out for anyone acting suspiciously, I'd appreciate it. Who are you here to retrieve?" Not that he had any intention of offering his help, but there was always the chance they were looking for someone he would prefer to have interrogated by War before the hyenas got their teeth into the poor soul.

"The subject is none of your business," said the Cherub, if more civilly than before. "I'm attuned, and so we can find him without any help, once we've decided on the best avenue of approach."

"Oh. Well. That's all good, then. You're good, I'm good, we all know what we're doing, and I have places to go, people to interrogate." Sean stood up, trying not to feel guilty over the Seneschal's disappointed face. "And if the subject of your investigation is possibly related in any way to _my_ job here, I'm sure you'd tell me, in the spirit of cooperation and all that."

He caught the glance between Joe and Ruhamah. "If we encounter any information useful to you, we know how to contact you," said the Cherub so blandly he knew a Seraph would have been twitching at the evasion.

"Right." Sean didn't waste time in leaving the office. As usual, Judgment would be a font of help and information. He'd prefer working with Flowers, given the choice.


	9. In Which I Am Remarkably Competent Despite The Circumstances

It may look strange that the kid sister gets to drive, but it'll draw less attention than Zhune taking off someone's bumper in the church parking lot. We're still one cycle away from getting through the red light. "Since when does Sunday morning have rush hour traffic? This is ridiculous."

"A good excuse for coming in late, though," Zhune says. "Right at the next light."

"Zhune? I can find my way back to the church without directions. Even _aside_ from the part where I'm following Linda's car." We inch forward towards the green light, though it's going to be red before we arrive at this rate. "It's a bad idea to bring her. Are we going to get in trouble if we lose a Hellsworn to Swordies?"

"Humans aren't that hard to replace." Zhune arches an eyebrow at me. "What, are you jealous?"

"Of a human? You can cling to whatever you want, so long as you leave me out of it." I slide through the light as it's turning red. "I don't know why you put up with it."

"It doesn't bother me," Zhune says. "Besides, I'm not the one who was carting around a human kid for months."

"She was useful." I don't want to talk about Katherine, not with him. It's none of his business, and I made sure he wouldn't have any reason to claim otherwise, the first chance I got.

"Any human can be useful, once they're bound. But holding onto the same one for too long increases the chances of being recognized. You were supposed to turn right at that light."

"I'm taking a route with less traffic. The later we get to the service, the less time I have to find what we need. Or were you going to attend both morning services and claim you need to compare them for the article?" He doesn't bother to dignify that with a response. "If they aren't keeping the contracts in the inside offices, we'll have to check the school buildings. Or search the rectory."

"Don't borrow trouble," Zhune says. "We'll deal with complications as they come up. Are you sure this route will get us to the church?"

"I'm sure. I know how to read a map, and I did exactly that before we set out. If we need to _leave_ in a hurry, I don't want to takes us down any dead ends." I barely hesitate at a stop sign, with another look at the dashboard clock. "I still think you should go looking. I can't crack a safe without leaving signs that I've done so."

"You know a Song that can hide you if anyone comes looking. And if it's necessary, you can crack the safe _quietly_ ," Zhune says.

"Yes, and then quietly leave a mess they will find, and if the contracts aren't in the safe, it's all the harder to look further. Or they might move them on us." I pull into the church parking lot, and take the first spot I can find. The 8:30 mass seems popular, despite the ungodly hour. "Remember Boston? Three days of work and we find out they moved the box to a different _city_."

"Stop stressing, little sister." Zhune climbs out of the car, and confiscates the keys from me when I follow. "Try to think...holy thoughts."

"I'm not the one doing the article," I say, and it's embarrassing how easy it is to feign a teenager's sulk. There are a few other latecomers making their way from the parking lot towards the open doors of the church; we might as well fall into character now. "There's probably something good on TV that I'm missing."

"It's a character-building experience," Zhune tells me, as we step inside. The clouds this morning keep the stained glass windows from shining, much like yesterday afternoon. It's a pity; I was hoping to look over them up close with the light coming through. My short-lived career as an architect may have focused on high-density low-income housing, but I can still enjoy other aspects of the field.

The last two pews in each row are being unroped for latecomers. We take seats in the back, Zhune pulling the notebook out from his coat. "I don't see your friend," he says softly, and smiles at the elderly couple taking their places at the other end of the pew.

I can spot plenty of people in black up at the front, a few priests and nuns, but there's no sign of Sean or the priest I met yesterday. "Maybe he's not religious." Back at the doors, the greeters watch for any more latecomers. Another minute and they'll be gone. "I need to use the bathroom. Back in a few."

I get directions from the ushers, trot off in the direction of the restrooms. Stepping in, I nearly bump into a woman coming out, a kid waddling behind her with a freshly-wiped face. The mother doesn't spare much attention for me, trying to drag her progeny back into his seat before the service gets into full swing.

No one else in the bathroom. I count to ten, then check the hall. Mother and child have disappeared, leaving this stretch of corridor empty. The ceilings here are lower than in the nave, part of the expansion built onto the church after the fact and kept short enough to not obstruct the high stained glass windows. Two bathrooms, a supply closet, a one-room bookstore, the kitchen. I pause at the corner where the hall takes a sharp right turn, waiting to hear any footsteps on the wooden floors.

Not a sound. Well, aside from the music making its way through the stone walls to my right. Time to hit the offices.

The first office is both empty and unlocked, though the door was closed. According to Zhune, the place where he interviewed the parish secretary. The locks on the file cabinets could be opened with a paperclip; I use more professional tools. Then it's a matter of flicking quickly through the files, letting my fingers feel for an artifact. 

Two filing cabinets later, I have one paper cut and no contracts. I close everything , and move on to the second office. This one has a locked door, almost as easy to unlock as the cabinet drawers. I search the desk inside, another filing cabinet, an office supply closet. Nothing. Well, nothing but a cashbox, which isn't what we're here for. The financial records could prove interesting for tracking money funneled by the Sword to various organizations outside the church. Pity I'm not looking for information. I lock the door of the second office behind me, and move into the third. Another unlocked door. Weren't they supposed to be increasing security? The office where I used to work had better security, and we had nothing more important to hide than shoddy blueprints and the occasional box of explosives.

I'm growing sick of file cabinets. This office has three sets, all of them old enough to creak as I open the drawers. The dusty smell of decades of church paperwork makes my nose wrinkle, suppressing a sneeze. Back here, I can barely make out the music of the service, now paused for some distant mumble that must be the priest speaking. Zhune got the better end of the deal, even sitting through the mass.

A file cabinet drawer squeaks shut. In the aftermath of the squeak, the distinct sound of a footstep outside. No time to consider whether this might draw more attention that would otherwise pass by: I yank Ethereal Form around me, with as little Essence as I dare put into the Song and still hope it'll work.

The door swings open. "Did you hear that?" Sean asks, looking right through me. He turns to examine the office, one hand under his jacket. "I thought I heard something."

"Don't try to distract me." The priest who follows him is the same one I met yesterday, and apparently comfortable enough with Sean to poke the Mercurian between the shoulder blades. Sean twitches, but steps aside to let the other man into the office. "I told you that we didn't want that sort of thing carried into a mass. It's disrespectful."

Sean produces a pistol from under his jacket. I'm holding both hands over my mouth to keep from breathing too loudly. Please let this Song hold out long enough for them to finish up in here and _leave_. My luck is not holding up today. "You do realize I can call up another gun," he says testily. And yet he hands it over.

"So you should have no complaints that you've been hampered in your duties. This is a house of God. Show some respect, during the mass if not at other times." Father what's-his-name, Sebastian, takes the gun as if it's a dead rat. Except I get the feeling that this priest would be nonchalant about a dead rat, and maybe say a prayer over it before tossing it in the trash. He does not seem big into modern weaponry. "You can have it back after services are concluded."

"And you're going to leave it in a desk drawer in an unlocked office?" I wonder if Sean's been having a bad day too. Either that or this is his favorite gun, because he's sounding irritable out of proportion to what's asked of him.

"I'll put it in the safe if it makes you feel better," the priest says.

Maybe my luck isn't so bad. 

Assuming I can get out of this alive. 

I move as quietly as I can manage, until I'm standing directly behind the priest while he opens the safe. His hand isn't sufficiently in the way to keep me from picking out the numbers at each stop.

"It does," Sean says. He leans on the back of the chair. This office isn't big; I could touch both of them without leaving this spot. And this is with the new short version of me. "I haven't picked up anything useful from the new couple yet, or that reporter. There's only so much I can do at a distance. Can you swing an introduction for hand-shaking after services?"

"I believe so." The safe door shuts with snick, and the priest spins the dial a few times. He stands up, brushing carpet-lint off the hem of his robe. "If the last man doesn't come to mass today, I'll see if we have contact information for him."

"I'm still voting for security cameras," Sean says. I have to duck to avoid an elbow to the face as he stretches, standing up. "Let's get you back before Father Turner starts giving me death glares across the altar."

"Oh, we wouldn't want _that_." The two of them move briskly back out of the office, and close the door behind them. This time, it's locked before they move on.

I wait until I can't hear footsteps anymore, then go for the safe.

The problem with Songs is that you can't be sure quite how long they'll last. In the case of Ethereal Form, the longer it lasts, the louder the racket when it wears off. Ideally, this use of the Song will last long enough to get me out of the office, but not so long that it's noisy when it finishes. I can't get back to my seat until it's gone, so if it's loud enough for them to hear--safe assumption with who knows how many Aware people in this building--they'll be checking the hallway. Will they check the bathrooms? Probably. I would.

The safe pops open. I dig through the papers on the bottom shelf, and find the contracts halfway through the stack. The ones I carry come out from inside my jacket, and then the swap is made. Simple. All that remains is getting these contracts to the people who want them without getting killed.

And...there's Sean's gun, just _sitting_ there. I pick it up through my shirt, mindful of the problem of leaving fingerprints. I've never been fond of small firearms. They break down if I wear them close for too long, and there's little pleasant in having a pistol explode in your hand. With all those delicate parts inside, you can't see from the outside if the interior's gone bad.

With that in mind, I channel a trickle of my resonance into the gun. Not enough to show any wear, not enough to break anything inside completely. Just a little encouragement to entropy. Call it payback for the time Sean went back on our contract and tried to put me in Limbo. Then I shut the safe door, double-check the office for any other signs I might have left behind, and step back into the hallway.

There's no one in the women's bathroom. There is, however, a window at the far end that I can get open with a little work. Not a very _big_ window, but large enough that someone my size could conceivably squeeze through. Then it's just a matter of waiting for the Song to wear off.

Disturbance rattles around me. I turn on the faucet in the sink, and begin washing my hands.

Twenty seconds, and the door swings open; Sean must have had to extract himself from his seat discretely before running. I look up at him blankly from the sink. "Um. Wrong bathroom."

"Sorry," he says, and looks over me, I _know_ he's resonating me, but no recognition dawns. "Did you see someone come through here just now?"

"I was...in a stall? Using the bathroom?" I turn off the faucet, and whack the big shiny button on the hand dryer. "Look, if she's upset enough to be avoiding you, either apologize or take the hint. But don't send flowers, because that always comes across as insincere."

"...right," Sean says, and blinks at me, looking lost. Then, "Thanks, sorry," and charges down the hall again. Presumably to check the parking lot outside. Best of luck on that one.

Once my hands are dry, I head back to where Zhune's seated, squeezing in beside him. I acquire a cursory sneer from the woman on his other side. "Took long enough," he murmurs. "What was all that about?" Left implied: was the noise necessary?

"Girl stuff," I say. Which is to say, ask me later, but nothing to worry about. If I don't give an answer implying "Flee for the hills" he's not going to stress it. We're tight-squeezed enough in the pew that passing the folded contracts over to him is covered in the shift as we try to find a way for me to not be squashed against the arm of the pew. The contracts disappear between the pages of his notebook.

And then I have to sit through the rest of the mass. Fidgety and bored is in-character for the role I'm playing. I try to keep it down, much as I'm eager to get out of this place. If we can return the contracts to Greed and leave town, seeing Sean will be nothing but the sort of unfortunate coincidence that pops up when someone who knows as many angels as I do spends this much time around angelic Tethers. I did not _ask_ to be known as a Tether-work specialist, but a disturbance-free resonance and familiarity with other Words means I'm ideally suited to taking on the jobs against other celestials. It's already killed me once

When the priest at the front--Father Turner, I assume, as that kind of frail elderly appearance implies seniority--gives the final blessing, I'm ready to bolt. Not that I'm so stupid as to draw that much attention to myself. I stand up with Zhune, and wait for him to go through the obligatory pleasantries with the humans around us. With Regan, this used to be my job. But then, when I was working with Regan, I had a vessel that looked more respectable. I get a few looks from young men around my apparent age--and not so young men, more surreptitiously--but no offers of conversation.

It takes us five minutes to make it to the door. Zhune puts an arm over my shoulder, and says, "Hold on a little longer, okay?"

"I thought we were going home now."

"I still need to interview the pastor."

"Isn't there such a thing as taking the dedication to journalism too far?" As soon as we get in the car, we're home free. As long as we're standing around here, Sean could show up again and get better luck with his resonance. Or acquire Malakite friends who might pick up something else.

"It's not a real article if I've only interviewed one person, Leah." He does have a Role to maintain.

"Fine. I'll wait by the car. Try to make it a fast interview?"

"He only has so much time before the next service. It won't take long." Zhune lets go of me, and makes his way back inside. I'm not sure if it's a relief to get a little space, or worrisome to get separated from my partner when there are angels on the prowl. I arbitrarily choose the former. He has a point: worrying about it isn't going to keep me out of their sight.

The parking lot has become a morass of cars attempting to exit around clusters of chatting parishioners, and a few cars trying to get in early for the next service. I begin to see why the two Sunday morning masses are scheduled half an hour apart. Making my way to the car looka like more trouble than it's worth, so I take a seat on one of the low walls at the edge of the parking lot. People-watching can be informative.

A young man about my vessel's age--maybe a few years older, though I intend to claim to be out of college if it comes up--saunters out of the parking lot, trailing parental-looking figures in the distance. He flashes a smile at me, as charming as the ones I can pull off, and outdistances his family to sit beside me uninvited. "Okay, I have to know. Father Sebastian or Father Foster? Because if it's Father Foster, I find an excuse to check out the restrooms as soon as he starts talking."

He's not bad-looking, if too young and too human for my tastes. College-aged vessels must be a common choice for roving celestials on both sides of the War. It provides a handy excuse for occasional bouts of bizarre behavior. I smile right back, and wonder if this is the resident Malakite, come to resonate anyone he doesn't recognize. "Funny, that's exactly what I did. Guess you're out of luck."

He makes a face. "I'll live. You new here?"

"Only passing through." With an emphasis on the passing, the instant Zhune shows up again. I scan the crowd for any sign of the Djinn, and notice the boy's mother is staring at the two of us like I'm going to corrupt her baby. "Let me guess: your mom doesn't like you talking to strange girls."

He follows where I'm looking, and rolls his eyes. "Don't mind her. I take it you're heading out? Or are you stuck with both masses?"

"I'm waiting for my brother." I give a one-shouldered shrug, the kind sullen teenagers are so fond of. "He took the car keys, or I'd leave without him and let him walk home."

"Guess you're stuck with me, then," the kid says, far too cheery for this hour of the morning. He drops down off the wall to face me. "They do coffee over in the meeting room after each service, and if you're lucky, cookies. But usually just coffee. There's also the school playground, except it's sized for little kids, so unless you're big into seesaws, not a lot of thrill there. Oh, and there are some neat gargoyles along the back roof, if you're into that kind of thing. I mean, it's a church. It's not set up for entertainment."

I wonder how long Zhune is going to be at his interview. "Thanks, but I'll pass. If I'm not here when he shows, I'll never hear the end of it."

"Suit yourself." He swings over to the other side of the wall. "Sure I can't convince you?" And whistles a tune I think I've heard before, watching me intently. With just the faintest ping of Essence being used.

"Um," I say.

"That's what I thought. Come on, I'll show you the gargoyles." He grabs my hand, leads me past the church towards the garden in the back. I know there's a garden in the back because I checked the facilities layout earlier. It has tall hedges, and trees, and all sorts of things to make it easy to stay out of sight of anyone who might be passing through. Which means I shouldn't be following a stranger placidly back there without letting Zhune know. I wish I could summon enough concern on this point to object. Is this what being a Djinn is like? Ready to do whatever you're told, because you have no particular attachment to what happens? If so, no wonder they go obsessive over their attuned. IThe personal involvement lets them become proactive about something.

We end up between a hedge and a tree, in a side area with a stone bench dedicated to some long-dead parishioner. "Have a seat," he says, "and give me your hands. There we go." A set of handcuffs snaps shut on my wrists. "Wow, Leo, I never would have recognized you in this vessel. But the Discord's distinctive from half a block away. Doesn't that bother you?"

"Only on all the occasions when it would be useful to be able to jump to celestial form," I say. I think the Song's beginning to wear off. "Do I know you?"

"You dropped a building on me once," the kid says cheerfully. "I don't think we ever gave you my name, though."

My brain is starting to catch up with what I want to do. "Oh, right. The Ofanite. How did that work out for you?" I hit the handcuffs with my resonance--and it slides right off, skids right into a splash of disintegrating flagstones at my feet. I can't remember the last time I had my resonance _bounce_.

"What, you think we'd use handcuffs you can break? On a Calabite?" I don't like the Ofanite's smirk, or remembering the last time I saw this angel. "As for the building, well, Trauma's never nice, but here I am again."

"Lucky me." I speculate on how far I could get before the Ofanite tackled me. Starting from a sitting position, and with handcuffs on? Not very. My estimate goes down further when the rest of the triad shows up. "Oh, _honestly_. That was years ago. How long do you people hold grudges?" I'd started to believe the Cherub had dropped her attunement to me, but even in a new vessel, I recognize that glare. The Seraph...looks different. Looks at me differently, and I'm not sure it's the Seraph after all. Possibly they don't send Seraphim after people like me.

"Judgment does not forget," the Cherub declares, a little too dramatically. It detracts from the statement. "Nor do we rest, until justice is done."

"No resting? So what was that four year gap about? Intensive training so that you can kill me _harder_?" And when is Zhune going to realize I'm missing and come find me? If the Cherub is attuned to the rest of the triad, he won't have a chance. If she's not, he can probably take out one from behind, and then... I don't know. I'm pretty sure he can't take two angels at once, and I'm not much help while handcuffed. Okay, not without cuffs, either.

"If we intended to kill you outright," says the Cherub, "we could do so directly."

"So you're saying that death is still an option, but not the _only_ option. Wait, let me guess, do we start with the threats, or move directly on to causing me pain?"

The tall man looks me up and down, slowly, eyes flat. I can't tell if that was supposed to be intimidating or not. The Ofanite says, "Actually, we were going to start with--" She breaks off at a small gesture from the Cherub, and shrugs.

"Leo, Calabite of Theft, formerly of Fire--"

"You missed one."

The Cherub blinks at me, mouth half open. And finally manages, "Excuse me?"

"Theft, formerly the War, _then_ formerly Fire. If you're going to do this formally, you should try to keep your facts straight. Seriously, what is it with you angels not keeping track of these things? Do you never talk to War?"

Oh, sure, I'm skating on thin ice when it comes to contracts I've signed, here. But I haven't yet divulged any confidential information. Only...implied it. And it was worth it for the look on the Cherub's face.

Unfortunately, the rest of the triad seems less thrown off. "The point," says the Ofanite, covering quickly as he paces around me, "is that we know it's you, we know what you've done--I mean, do we need to list all your crimes specifically?"

"Please do." I wonder how long I can stall them merely by being bright and helpful. "Especially if you could go into detail about the ones right before the building went down. I tend to get short-term memory loss after Trauma, and I'd hate to find I was guilty for something I don't remember." Not that I've forgotten that incident. I'm still annoyed that Regan to sent me to die, but I couldn't ask for a better funeral pyre.

The Cherub stares at me so fixedly I'm sure that if she were a Calabite, I'd be in pain right now. "We can give you a full accounting of your crimes _later_ ," she says, "after you've been taken into protective custody. You will be offered, despite your past actions, a chance to atone for your sins and accept redemption." Her voice says she doesn't think I should be given any of the above. "If you choose not to take this opportunity, the punishment will fit the crime."

"I'm really feeling the love, here." I take a look over the three of them. No way I can fight my way out of this, and I'm right next to a Tether of the Sword. I'm also a day and a half away from having to worry about dissonance from lingering in one place too long. For all I know, it could take them that long to get the list of everything I'm accused of. "And those are the options available to me?"

"It's not so bad as it sounds," says the Ofanite. He perches on the bench next to me, with a hopeful smile. He'd be the good cop. I don't think the Cherub needed coaching to play bad cop. "You may have screwed up in the past, but you've done better things since then. Enough to catch the attention of certain people. This is why we're trying to give you an opportunity."

I look down at the handcuffs on my wrists. An artifact enchanted to be unbreakable, but not, so far as I can tell, anything special on the lock. Zhune can get these off me in under a minute; I can in five, if no one takes my lockpicks. "Someone did tell me that opportunity was fickle, and I should seize it when it appears." I am not looking forward to losing my remaining dignity, but the options are slim.

"Oh?" The Ofanite returns to pacing around me. "Good advice. Who told you that?"

"Valefor." I smile nicely at all three of them. And then begin shrieking my lungs off.

Rolling off the bench backwards is enough to make the Cherub's first pounce miss. It's the tall man who grabs me, hand pressed firmly over my mouth while the rest of him holds me down on the ground. I couldn't ask for a more evocative pose if I'd set up the scene myself. Now all I need is an audience. " _Hell_ ," says the Ofanite, "get her out of here fast."

If screaming was undignified, being tossed over someone's shoulder is even worse. I'm guessing Malakite, or an odd Elohite, by the way the man's expression only turns to vaguely put-upon as he scoops me up. He keeps one hand over my mouth the whole time. I can fight decently, but not from mid-air. I put up enough resistance to keep him busy, but not enough that either of the others tries to help him out. There's nothing like being ignored as an insignificant threat to make me feel competent.

I can hear people moving towards the garden, but not fast enough. At this rate, I'll just force a few minutes of awkward explanations from people in the Tether. Not satisfying. Where's Zhune when I need him? This is the sort of thing a Djinn partner is supposed to be there for: finding me when I'm kidnapped, and getting me _out_ of this situation.

Unless they've already jumped him, and I didn't notice. They've probably been talking to Katherine, and she knows I was working with him. I'm not quite paranoid enough to believe this entire situation was a setup, but--okay, who am I kidding, I _am_ willing to believe that, given a few more pieces of evidence. Sean's the only one who doesn't fit that theory. I can't imagine Judgment would want him around, or vice versa, if either of them knew about the other and wanted to grab me.

And there's Sean, whipping around a corner with a gun drawn--I can't tell if it's the one I tampered with--and looking as dangerous as he ever manages. "What the fuck's going on?"

I kick at the angel holding me and try to look innocent and helpless in his direction. The big bad Judgment angels are kidnapping poor little me, oh help. I need to beat someone up just to regain some vestige of dignity.

"This is none of your business," says the Cherub. "We're a retrieval triad. We've found our target, and we're retrieving her. Go back to what you were doing."

Sean doesn't seem willing to accuse Judgment of kidnapping innocent humans yet. More's the pity. However, neither does he lower his gun. "So who is she?"

"No one you would know," says the Ofanite, to the point as always. "Look, you're concerned, but this not War business."

Like hell it isn't. I yank my head away from the angel's grip. "Sean, you don't want to let--" And that's as far as I get before I'm shut up again.

If I weren't so worried about imminent death, I'd find these expressions hilarious right now. The Ofanite is only startled, but the Cherub has turned her glare towards Sean. And the poor lone Mercurian of War is starting to realize his doom.

I wonder if he's figured out who I am yet, or if he's trying to work out who he's met would be hauled off by Judgment. Depending on how many demons he's worked with, the list could be long.

"You know her?" the Cherub asks quietly. The ruckus behind us in the garden is dying down; people are going to give up looking for the problem if I don't do something soon.

"I don't know," Sean says briskly, but he wasn't fast enough on the draw to avoid suspicion. "She knows my name, but I don't recognize her. How about you let her finish a sentence?"

"She'll only start screaming again," says the Ofanite, who is correct on this point. The hand over my face is so firmly in place I can barely breathe, and I'm making sad little whistling sounds through my nose. Pathetic.

Well, let me give Sean a hint. I find a tree branch in the right position, and stretch out my resonance as far as it will go to erase the branch right around where it connects to the tree. The Cherub's yelp when it hits is priceless, as is the way she and the Ofanite peer up for someone doing branch-throwing. Pity it wasn't big enough to do any real damage.

Sean stares at me, wide-eyed. I'd say he's worked it out. Clever Mercurian. Now get me out of here before I tell Seraphim of Judgment all about our work together. Not that he seems to be coming up with any clever plans. Do I have to do all the thinking around here?

In the instant where two angels are looking up, one's staring at me, and another's paying attention to my attempts to wiggle out of his grip, Zhune steps into view behind Sean. I've never been so glad to see the Djinn in my life. What he's going to do about four angels is beyond me--

I hit the ground hard, barely able to see as noise rolls through my ears and mind and Forces. Thunder. Right. Good idea. I can't walk straight, but Zhune pulls me away, fast enough that I have to run to keep up with him. "Don't talk," he whispers, and I can only nod, run where he leads me. My head rings with the disturbance and noise and sheer mental screech of the Song. This is not going to give us much of a head start. I'm not giving us much of a head start, I can't _run_ properly, but Zhune is talking very quickly with people, explanations I can't follow right now about his sister and an attack and calling the police and I don't know what. My head hurts. I need to get out of here.

By the time he stuffs me into the passenger seat of the car, I'm only dazed, trying to piece things back together. "Ow."

"You have this amazing knack for finding trouble," Zhune says, pulling out of the parking lot. The crowd has cleared, leaving him enough room to drive without running down any pedestrians. "What was that about?"

"Triad of Judgment," I say, head in my hands. This headache is nearly as bad as coming out of Trauma. "Ofanite pegged me from the Discord. Think the Cherub's attuned."

Zhune appears...offended. How strange. "Judgment ought to keep its own damn hands to itself," he says. "And stick to angels. As if having the Game down our necks wasn't enough."

I sort through truth for information I'm willing to give. "Remember how I dropped a building on a triad, once? I think that's the same one. Cherub's the woman. Ofanite's the kid. Don't know what the other one was, but he's not acting like a Seraph." I pull my hands down, and work the lock picks out from my coat. "Why does everyone hold a grudge? Why can't it ever be _business_? No, I screw someone over in the course of doing my job once, and four years later they're still trying to get back at me for it." The lock proves surprisingly simple, popping up after a minute of fiddling.

"Cherub attuned, you said?"

"I think so. Why?" This is not a good time to mention it happened four years ago.

"They're right behind us."

I turn around to look. Yup. Definitely them. "Fuck."

"My thoughts exactly. Have a clever plan? Preferably one that doesn't involve me trying to out-drive an Ofanite."

"Clever plan. Right." I shake my head to clear away the lingering echoes of the Song of Thunder. It's the first time I've ever been in the blast radius of that thing, and I'd rather not repeat it. I think we've officially blown "quiet." Fuck, what's the Boss going to say? Nothing, if Judgment catches me first. "This won't last, but I can delay them. Hit the brakes when I tell you to." I crawl into the back seat of the car, watching the sedan behind us creep closer. We're not going all that fast, only fifty on city streets, but they're not trying to ram us, either. Only keeping close. Reminding me that wherever I go, they can follow. "Brakes."

We slow down so fast the Ofanite has to hit the brakes as well, close enough for me to grin and wave at him. And then I start working on resonating my way through their hood and engine block. "Accelerate when you feel like it."

Zhune hits the gas, and we pull away again, the triad's car lurching to a stop in the middle of the street. "Nice," says my partner. "But they'll get a new car."

"I know. But it gives us enough time to drop off the contracts at the Greed Tether before worrying about them." I climb back into the front seat. "This? This is a problem. This is beyond the kind of problem where we don't find the files easily, and right up to the problem where I have a Cherub of Judgment who knows where I live."

"And in another hour, my Role," Zhune says dryly. He shrugs that off. "It's not much of a Role. I don't expect problems from there. I'll have to be more careful when infiltrating angelic Tethers."

"Suggestions?"

"You're the one with the clever plans."

I slump back in my seat. "I'm out of clever plans. I used them all up in getting the contracts, and then getting away from the triad. Staying away permanently is beyond my realm of expertise. Give me an hour to think it over."

"Right. So we'll go with a basic backup plan." Zhune slows down, to a speed that won't get us pulled over the first time we pass a cop. "I'll deliver the contracts, and make sure we get a receipt. You keep going. I'll catch up with you later."

Splitting up was not the first plan that sprang to my mind. "You'll catch up? When? And where exactly am I going that'll keep Judgment off my back?" Four years to think it over, and today they finally decide they want a chat. I wonder how much it would cost me to ask my Prince to break this attunement on me. Princes can do that, right?

"I'll catch up," Zhune repeats, patiently. "I'll give you an address. Trust me on this one, Leo." He takes a hand off the steering wheel to pat me on the shoulder. "You spent how long dodging the Game? You can keep away from Judgment until I catch up, now that you know they're following you."

"No one from the Game was attuned to me," I say. But it's not like I have a wide variety of options available. "Don't take too long, okay?"

"Don't worry," Zhune says. "I'll be right behind you."


	10. An Interlude, In Which I Am, Fortunately, Not Present

Dolores had chosen Father Foster's office as the largest available for the discussion, and had pulled out enough chairs--comfortable chairs, even, from other offices--for everyone to sit down. 

No one was sitting.

Sean had put away his gun, for what that gesture was worth. He was getting the feeling the hyenas weren't even going to notice. "If you'd told me who you were looking for--"

"It wasn't any of your business!" Hakupha's expression betrayed Cherub origins in the way her face twisted when she snarled, more leonine than human. "If you hadn't delayed us--"

"I wasn't _shooting_ at you, I was only asking for some basic information--"

"Quiet!"

Four pairs of eyes turned towards the Seneschal, and the ruler she had slammed down on the desk. "Gentlemen," Dolores said, "you will all sit down and be quiet."

The triad sat down. So did Sean. All eyes remained on the small nun. "Now," she said sweetly, "let's take this from the top. Sean. These are Servitors of Judgment, sent on official business. Regardless of your personal feelings on this matter, they are due the respect and assistance appropriate to their task." She turned to the others. "Similarly, this is a distincted Servitor of War, currently in good standing with his Archangel, who has committed no crime. He is _also_ due the respect equal to his position, and civility. It's an insult to withhold information not out of matters of security, but from some misguided belief that he would interfere in your duties. Because he wouldn't. Would he?"

Sean sent a quiet prayer of thanks for there not being a Seraph in the room. "I have no intention of interfering with a standard retrieval mission," he said, striving for civility in his tone. The Cherub was still bristling, but Ruhamah's neutral look suggested he was getting close. "If this is someone I know, though, I _could_ have provided you with more information."

"Or attempted to run off with her first," suggested Ruhamah, politely enough to earn only a mild look of censure from the nun. "In any case, the point's now moot. Can we be civil long enough to exchange some information?"

"Sure." Sean folded his arms. "You first."

Hakupha stood up, glowering. "After all you've done so far, you think we ought to be the ones to volunteer information? You haven't offered any assistance! You've done nothing but interfere with our assignment!"

Joe stood up. Put one hand on the Cherub's head. Gently pushed her back down to the chair. Sat down again.

"She has a point," said Ruhamah. And did not continue, _Though I would have put it in different words._ The look she gave her coworker was enough to express this without the words.

Sean slouched back in his chair, working through the gaps in his memory. There were advantages to having incriminating information removed via memory pearls at regular intervals. Not being quite sure how much Leo would be revealing if grabbed by Judgment was _not_ one of them. "Tell you what. If you can confirm _who_ the demon was for me, I'll tell you if I do know her, and how, or if she was only using a name she'd picked up to confuse matters."

"We didn't say she was a demon," muttered Hakupha. 

"I figured the part where she resonated her way through a tree branch was a _hint_." Sean took a deep breath. Did not mention that there were only so many people with the Calabite of Fire attunement out there who would know him on sight. "If you want to make an official accusation, file one. Right now, we're wasting our time arguing while she's getting further away."

The triad exchanged a brief series of hand signals, some more emphatic than others. Sean wondered if one that looked like a rude gesture from Heaven meant what he thought it did. When they turned back to him, it was the Ofanite who spoke. "Her name is Leo, a former Calabite of Fire. Now of Theft, according to our latest information. Do you know her?"

"And you didn't think it was worth telling me that a Servitor of _Theft_ was in the area when I was trying to do security for a Tether?"

Dolores coughed pointedly. Sean sat back down before the Malakite could come over and push him back into his chair. It was no more than he'd guessed, but the reaction seemed appropriate. Judgment would never apologize for the oversight, not to War. "If you'd told me that, I could have given you better advice for trying to talk him into anything. I mean, I assume you're not trying to kill him outright--"

"It's still an option," said the Cherub.

"--or you wouldn't be hauling him off in handcuffs."

Ruhamah shifted in his chair, watching Sean intently. "You knew her in a previous vessel?"

"Right. Or I would have recognized her when I saw her in the bathroom." Stupid gender-specific pronouns. Sean waited for another question. He wasn't about to volunteer information to Judgment, of all Words.

"Care to explain how you know this demon by name?" The Ofanite must've been nominated the speaker for the group. At least he didn't have to put up with the Cherub shouting every other sentence at him.

"A few years back, he came into possession of some information that would have been damaging to War if it had been released into demonic hands. I was the one put in charge retrieving the information." This was not the time to mention that he'd been the one who screwed up enough to let Leo get the information in the first place. Or that they'd been trying to keep it away from Judgment, too. Or that he no longer had any idea what it was that had needed to be kept a secret. "He'd set things up such that vessel-killing him would result in the release of the information. So I grabbed a Seraph of Trade to help negotiate, and got what we needed back from him, along with a binding contract not to release any of the information." That didn't sound too incriminating. Dealing with demons wasn't entirely against the laws of Heaven, not with the permission of one's Archangel, and for a cause like that.

Ruhamah nodded slightly. "And she appealed to you for help because...?"

"To confuse you? And throw you off-balance long enough to give his partner a chance to jump everyone? This is Leo we're talking about." Sean shrugged, fiddling with the gun under his jacket. "I suppose you wouldn't know how he'd react, if you've only ever tried to kill him before, and not dealt with him beyond that." And that was a _distinct_ lack of a significant look between two members of the triad. A very pointed attempt not to look at each other, even. Sean was careful not to smirk. So he wasn't the only one with a little guilt. "Okay, here's a hint. He's not going to believe a thing you say until you have a Seraph say it, or someone from Trade put it in writing. He's had angels break agreements with him before." Sean did not mention he'd been one of them. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, as so many things did.

"We don't need her to listen to us until she's in a secure location," Ruhamah said. "Trying to convince her of anything during the retrieval was a mistake. We won't make the same one next time. But we appreciate the data point." He hesitated, then added, "Has she been working for Theft that long? We were under the impression she'd been Renegade until about a year back."

Sean gave himself a mental kick, and said, "I ran into him six months ago, nearly by accident. That's when I found out he was with Theft."

"And didn't report the encounter?"

"What, to Judgment? It didn't seem necessary. I run into demons a lot, in my line of work. If they're not trying to ignite a Tether--or me--it's seldom worth escalating. I'm not a Malakite. I made a note for War's files about the change in status, and moved on." Sean dragged up the old conversation, took a gamble. "I was checking to see if he still had possession of the human child he'd picked up somewhere. He told me she was in Judgment's hands, the story checked out, so I considered that matter settled." And there hadn't been any good excuse to pry the kid away from Judgment for a private interview with a Seraph. "How did you track him down?"

Another flurry of gestures. The Cherub finally spoke up, voice neutral. "I've been attuned to this demon as a subject of investigation since an encounter with him several years back. After I recovered from Trauma, the Destroyer was deemed too low-priority to pursue."

"So what changed that decision?" Sean asked brightly. And prayed desperately that it had nothing to do with discovering Leo had been doing work for War. No, they would have brought that up earlier, right?

Ruhamah shifted position in the chair again, restless but not willing to risk being returned to his seat by the Malakite to keep order in the room. "She put a human child in our care. And we tracked down a...previous acquaintance of hers, for a brief interview."

Sean hoped the interview with a particular Outcast Kyriotate--or was it not Outcast any longer? he'd have to request an investigation once he got back to Heaven--was brief, and hadn't touched on any of the work with War. "And?"

"And it was decided that she was a candidate for redemption," said Ruhamah, tilting his chair back. What a curiously subject-free turn of phrase. Who made those decisions in Judgment? "Thus we mean to haul her in. Whether she'll admit it to herself or not, she's been doing honorable things, between service to Princes. If we can pry her loose from them for long enough to have someone talk sense into her, she'll see reason."

"Or choose to accept the consequences of her actions," added the Cherub, with her first sign of cheer.

"I see." Sean considered the possibilities. Redemption was good, but Leo getting interviewed by Seraphim of Judgment before someone had a chance to tackle him with some memory pearls was less good. "Tell you what. Let me come along when tracking her down, and I'll give you any information I have that might help convince her to see things your way. _Without_ traumatizing her so much she runs back to Hell to be saved from the big bad Judges. She doesn't have a lot of reason to think well of your Word, but I've dealt with her on an equal basis before. She might listen to me." Long enough for him to invoke _his_ Archangel, anyway.

Another series of gestures. "It's acceptable," said Hakupha, so grudgingly he guessed she'd been outvoted by her triad. "With the understanding that we're the ones who will take the demon into custody."

"Of course," Sean said. Just because he worked for a Seraph didn't mean he couldn't tell lies. War, not Revelation. Judgment could take Leo into custody all they wanted, once he was done with the demon. "Consider it a deal."

"There, now," chirped Dolores, clapping her hands. "Doesn't it work better when everyone sits down and works together like adults?"


	11. In Which Planning Is Required

Ordinarily, I'd avoid tables by the window. Too easy for people I want to avoid to see me. Since at the moment everyone who knows what I look like can apparently track me to the far corners of the Earth, I have a window seat. I'd rather have a chance to see who's coming.

And I still don't see Zhune until he sits across from me at the table. He has a drink with whipped cream and a chocolate drizzle. I'm sulking over my black coffee. "I see you haven't been grabbed yet," he says.

"Lucky me. No, no one's appeared. I imagine they're working out their own clever plan for how to take me down faster." Unfortunately, I don't have a clever plan to match it. Most of my non-explosive strategies are based on fleeing the crime scene, which doesn't work so well when people can follow me. "Did you get a receipt?"

"Signed and dated by the Seneschal." Zhune stretches out in his chair, one foot finding mine under the table. He moves it when I glare at him, but he's still smiling. "That having been taken care of, we move on to the next issue. What have you come up with so far?"

"Nothing useful. We could shoot the Cherub and run if we can spot the triad before they spot us, but that's temporary. I don't know how long they're willing to chase me." I thought that four years of _not_ chasing me meant they didn't care. Finding out otherwise is no welcome revelation. Nor is the way I'm creating new sets of half-truths I need to keep straight around my partner. "We need to get proactive, and I have no idea how. Well. No ideas that do more than give us another week."

Zhune takes in the one other person in the coffee shop, the gray-haired woman reading a magazine behind the counter. No one in earshot. "I have an idea," he says.

"That I'm not going to like."

"How did you guess?"

"The part where you didn't explain it." I take a fortifying gulp of coffee. Dreadful. I'd rather have a beer if I'm going to be pouring legal drugs into my bloodstream. "Okay, hit me."

"We get the attunement removed."

"What, by convincing a Cherub of Judgment to not follow through on pursuing a suspect?" I blink at him, and then catch up to what he meant. It's not the sort of plan I make. "Oh. No. _No_ , we're not trying that. We spoke to him less than a week ago, and we've done one simple job since then. I already owe him for this vessel. We can figure out something else. Something that doesn't involve asking him for help."

"He probably won't be upset if we have an interesting gift lined for when he arrives," Zhune says, ever so patiently. He's not the one on thin ice with our Prince.

"We don't have an interesting gift. We have a receipt. A receipt is not interesting. It's basic competence, which, unless he has much lower standards than I realized, is not impressive." I chug coffee to distract myself, and make a mental note to get hot chocolate next time, no matter how girly of a beverage it is. I can't believe people ingest this stuff voluntarily. "Or are you suggesting we try to plan, execute, and present a daring heist while dodging that triad? And possibly Sean. Four against two is not odds I like."

"I'm suggesting we take a bug and make it a feature," Zhune says. He smiles. It's the kind of smile that comes before one of his crueler plans. "How about we offer him the Cherub?"

"...you can't be serious." Not that the idea isn't attractive to my vengeful streak. The Judge has shoved me around since the first time we met, advocated killing me on multiple occasions, and took a simple defensive maneuver on my part personally. Dropping her in front of a Prince would be very nearly fair. Not to mention it would give him someone besides me to focus any ire towards if he doesn't appreciate the interruption.

Zhune licks whipped cream off his lips, cat-like as he watches me. "I've seen it work before, if with the Game rather than Judgment. The principle's the same. The difficult part is separating the Cherub and pinning her down for long enough to make the call, without alerting the others enough that they call their own boss."

"I thought Dominic didn't show up for invocations? Though I suppose they can phone someone up to pass the message along." I'm working on the actual plan now, and Zhune can tell. Smug bastard that he is. I'd hold it against him, but he runs with _my_ far-fetched plans. "This won't work if she has Celestial Tongues. Not unless we knock her out first, but that would be...less entertaining, wouldn't it?"

"Far less." Zhune's eyes glitter. It reminds me uncomfortably of his celestial form. "If she does, we'll hear it when she calls for help, and we can shoot her. Right back to plan B. If she can't call for help, we get a chance to see how he likes the present."

A giggling couple walks into the coffee shop, hands running across each other. I drop my half-full cup of coffee into the trash. "This place is too public. Have a new car to talk in?"

"Down the block." Zhune offers me the keys. "In the glovebox this time. People should know better."

"You have a knack for that." I grab the keys, stand up. "Right. Let me think."

Zhune works through his mocha on the way to the car, giving me enough time and quiet to figure things out. "This is going to be messy," I say, once inside. "This is _not_ an elegant plan. Can you get a tranq gun quickly?"

"I know someone who'd have one," Zhune says. "He won't like it if the triad shows while we're picking it up, but what's that to us?" He shoves the empty cup into the glovebox. "Getting the rest of the triad down without alerting the Cherub?"

"Exactly. If I understand that resonance correctly, she'll know they're in general danger, but won't get the forewarning about incoming harm. And we need some place large and empty with several exits. Abandoned mall, Wal-Mart under construction, that kind of thing."

"There's always one," Zhune says. "I can ask while we're getting the tranqs. Anything else?"

"You'll need to yank your attunement to the Soldier, and find someone who can hold a gun around here to attune to. If we have a Mercurian coming at us, involving humans should distract him nicely." I keep an eye in the rearview mirror for anyone familiar in the cars behind us. "I can lend you the Essence if you need it. How far down are you from singing Thunder?"

"Three. I wanted to make sure to get you to the car before anyone followed." Zhune considers the details so far. "They're not going to let me get close enough to use that again. Too bad Ethereal Form can't be passed off to someone else."

"We only need to get the Cherub into the trunk of the car and drive out of sight," I say, hoping it's true. "If we're lucky, we can tranq them all and sort through the bodies, but I don't think we're going to be that lucky. Three to four angels who know what they're doing in combat, up against the two of us."

"Risky," Zhune agrees.

"You don't have to sound so _happy_ about it."


	12. An Interlude, In Which People, As Usual, Plot My Doom

"She hasn't moved in half an hour," said the Cherub. "She's planning something."

"Of courses she's planning something," said Ruhamah, scrolling through the map of the city he'd pulled up on his laptop. "Remember the last time we ran into her? With the exploding? I suggest we don't walk into any buildings she's been standing in for more than ten minutes." He turned to the Mercurian. "We could try smoking them out. Do you have any gas grenades?"

Sean made a show of checking inside his jacket. "Maybe one or two. And let's avoid any approaches that are too perfect for sniping."

"Oh, we _know_ about the sniper thing." Ruhamah tapped a point on the map. "Triangulation says she's in there, and the place's website says it closed two months ago. An abandoned department store. How perfect. I'm not stepping inside. I remember what happened the last time we walked into an abandoned building with her. There's a reason we waited to jump her by the church."

Sean tossed a grenade back and forth in his hands. "Here's my suggestion. Wait a month for her to decide you've given up, then try again."

"And give you time to move in on your own?" Hakupha asked, from her position near the door to the room. "We were sent to retrieve a demon. We're not about to abandon the assignment because it's become _difficult_. Especially to give you the convenience of removing her to a location of your choosing for interrogation--"

"Look, I'm not the one who was chasing her down, so stop insisting I'm trying to swipe her out from under you. Remember I don't have a way to _find_ her again." Sean spun his chair about, irritable and restless. "Let me put it this way. Everyone in this room who _hasn't_ lost a vessel to Leo, raise your hand." He put up his hand, saw the Malakite do the same. "So as long as Silent Joe here isn't offering better plans, could we listen to mine? I'm not in the mood to get blown into pieces either."

The Ofanite tapped away at the keyboard. "We'd be more inclined to listen to your suggestions if you were offering a plan, rather than an absence of one. I suggest we contact a few people, and point the police toward that building. If we can flush Leo and the other demon out, they won't be able to take advantage of any defenses they've prepared. Leo's the only one we need, so if they split up, we can concentrate on her. Hakupha can ensure we move to the correct exit. Once I'm close, I can hit the Calabite with Celestial Charm again."

"Because that worked so well last time," Sean said.

Hakupha sniffed. "It was working until you interfered. It was your distraction that let the other demon approach without our notice."

Sean chose not to argue that point, though he grabbed the grenade out of the air more forcefully than before. "In that case, if we're concerned about Leo having defenses set up against us, why are we willing to throw humans at him? He might be willing to take them out and hope we're close enough to be caught in the blast."

"She's refrained from violence towards humans before," Ruhamah said. "Gone out of her way to protect one of them. It seems unlikely that she'll turn to gratuitous murder."

"I'm not willing to bet on _likely_ , Wheel. He might only avoid damaging the humans he likes, or when not pressed. If it doesn't apply to strangers--"

"She runs," Ruhamah said. He spun around to face Sean, the wheels on the chair squeaking beneath him. "So long as she's given the chance, she'll run. It's one of her few endearing traits. The only reason she's stopped now is because she believes running won't work, and that she needs to face us on ground of her choosing. We throw a wrench in that plan, she'll start running again."

Sean frowned. "And if she runs away faster than we can catch her, where does that put us?"

"I'm faster," said the Ofanite. Grinned toothily. "And when that fails, a bullet in the leg does wonders for slowing a demon down."


	13. In Which No Plan Survives Contact With The Enemy

Zhune slouches against an empty shelf. "If I'd thought about it at the time," he says, "I could have attuned to one of them in passing. It would be convenient to know when they were coming."

"And less convenient if you couldn't shoot that person," I say. The tranq gun sits on a dusty shelf beside me, in easy reach but not taking any subtle damage from being in my presence. "If Sean's with them, I don't know what they're going to do. He's not an idiot."

"Neither is Judgment," Zhune says. He tosses a scrap of brick down the aisle, watching it bounce. "Even if he's not along, they might not walk into a building that could be trapped."

"They did it once before."

"Once," Zhune says. "Judgment makes many mistakes...once. They seldom make the same mistake twice."

I don't have much to say to that. Zhune must have more experience with Judges than I do. Which, given our relative ages, makes sense. "Do you think we have _any_ chance of this working?"

"A small chance. And however it fails to work... might provide opportunities for other plans."

"Let me guess: coming up with the clever replacement plan is also my idea."

"We all have our talents." Zhune chuckles. "I'm better at getting shot, if it comes to that. Or did you want to trade places?"

"Oh, no. Far be it from me to take away your chance to flirt with death."

"I prefer flirting with you."

Both of us shut up as the man we picked up at the mall runs down the aisle towards us. "Outside," he says, breathlessly. There wasn't much in the way of selection, but it would have been nice to find someone in better shape. It also would have been nice to have two more days to plan this, more weapons, and a winged pony that breathes fire. "The police, man, they're actually here! Two cars!"

"Interesting gambit," Zhune says. He turns to me. "You can disappear for a few minutes, but that'll pinpoint your location at the end. I can't do the same, though I could evade during their search. What's the plan?"

"Run out to where they're waiting, or wait out the cops?" The human is sweating, eyes wide as he waits for new instructions. "If I'd had time to install surveillance cameras--"

"You didn't. Chop chop, Leo. Give us a plan."

I point at the human. "Remember the door in the back we showed you? Head out, and shoot anyone you see. They might try shooting back, but don't worry about it. They're only trying to scare you."

"Do what she says," says Zhune, when the human hesitates. They'll be able to smell him coming, with how heavily he stinks of sweat. And off the temporary Servant goes, already shaking.

I pick up the tranq gun, swap to Helltongue. "If we're unlucky? He'll peg the Malakite in the head."

Zhune follows me down the aisle, a few steps behind the mortal. The point is to keep close enough that the Cherub runs in the right direction, but far enough back that when the door opens, I'm not the one getting shot. I point Zhune over towards another exit. "Give me long enough to start kiting the Cherub, then give me some backup. They'll expect you, but they should be distracted."

"Try not to end up dead," Zhune says. "That would screw up all the contingency plans."

"They're not trying to kill me. Yet."

"Sure of that?"

"No. And I wouldn't put it past Sean to shoot to kill even if the others want to capture." No, Sean doesn't want me in Judgment hands, but he has no pressing reason to keep me alive, either. "If the cops get too near, drop this sucker and grab one of them. I'm sure you can handle the sweet-talking from there, and if he runs it'll give them someone to chase."

Zhune does not look thrilled at the idea of switching attuned humans twice in one day. But he only says, "If they get too close," then splits off towards the far door.

I switch back to English, as the human's hesitating at the door before us. "Leave the door open when you step out, and I'll be right behind you. That way I can get them in the back while they're looking at you. If you don't see them at first, head down to the corner of the back alley."

"Right," says the man. I'd feel more sympathy for him if he hadn't parked his car across two spots back at the mall. Sometimes, the humans make it so _easy_ for me to decide who to harass.

Zhune's Servant throws the door open, and charges out, gun waving. In a rare show of restraint on the part of Judgment, he doesn't go down under a rain of bullets. I can make out the sound of more than one set of footsteps as he disappears from my view. Hiding from him in hopes he'll run by, while waiting to see someone they care about? I whisper up a cover of EthForm. This has not been my day. Time to go do something risky and stupid in hopes that my luck will change.

I shadow the human as he jogs down the alley, his footsteps loud enough to cover mine. If the Cherub follows the direction of her attunement and decides this is a backup vessel of mine--then she's not very observant, I would never run like that, but it could be entertaining. There are three dumpsters back here, and nothing else to hide behind. They can't all be crouched down waiting for me to show up, can they?

Or possibly they can be. In a dark space between two of the dumpsters, I see the Ofanite waiting, eyes alert as he lets this man pass by. This is not going to work if the Cherub sits here waiting to _see_ me emerge instead of checking her attunement to find my location. Doesn't anyone in this triad remember that I have Ethereal Form? The idiot human doesn't notice as he jogs past the hidden angel. I consider tripping the man to spark a confrontation--

Oh, forget _this_. I stop, raise my tranq gun, and pop the Ofanite in the chest. Each dart is supposed to have enough punch to knock down a horse, so they should be able to slow down the most annoyingly speedy of angels.

The Judge realizes what's going on, of course. Whips up a gun and fires, at where I was standing when I shot _him_. The human spins around, his own gun waving, and I duck back on the far side of a dumpster before Zhune's Servant can shoot me by accident. Now that would an embarrassing way to hit Trauma.

Sean pops up from further down, eyes searching for the Calabite he knows is in the alley. It's enough to catch the human's attention, and then there's a series of badly-aimed shots at the Mercurian. Somewhere inside the store, the police are shouting, and no doubt coming this way. I could use some backup, Zhune. Any day now.

The Ofanite staggers out of hiding, a beautiful sight, but he's not looking at the human either. This crowd is too ready for my tricks. I have a few minutes left on this Song, and the first part of the fight won't take minutes. I can wait behind the dumpster, watching, until the Cherub appears.

Sean ducks between the wild shots, snags the gun out of our pet human's hand with one smooth gesture. So much for _that_ distraction. I throw off a dart at the Mercurian, and it would have hit if he wasn't so fast to get behind cover. It's enough to draw his attention, though, and he shoots back with something far more lethal.

I'm not as fast as he is; the bullet grazes my cheek as I dodge away, a fiery streak to remind me of things I'd rather forget. It feels like being back home in Sheol with my first boss. I scramble away from the dumpster. They'll check next to cover first. I bet they have more ammunition than I do, at that.

The human breaks and runs, pounding away from this side of the building. I can't tell if that was a loss of nerve after his instructions ran out, or Zhune swapping attunements. I'll hope for the latter, even if it _does_ mean police are about to arrive.

I risk edging away from the wall to see what I can on the other side of the dumpster. The Ofanite's curled up on the ground, eyes still open but otherwise inert. Sean--I can catch a flash of movement behind one of the dumpsters near the end. What, is he going to wait me out? I can renew the Song when it wears off if I have to. And the police will get back here before then.

Zhune's door slams open, off to the left. I can hear Sean and someone else moving to my right, to see who's coming out.

In this case? A police officer, gun at the ready, and Zhune right behind him. He may not be the fastest at coming up with new plans, but the Djinn knows how to use the tried and true ones to his benefit. "Suspect ran that way," Zhune murmurs into the man's ear, barely loud enough for me to hear, and the cop repeats it, shouting out while pointing in the direction the abandoned mortal ran. Three more cops pour out of the building, follow his directions.

"Other way for the rest of them," Zhune murmurs, and the cop nods, staring at the man curled up on the ground. Poor little Ofanite; I imagine it's no fun to get knocked out when you're all about motion. He should have known better than to harass me. I'm a nicer person when other people leave me alone. "Be careful. They're armed."

I stand up fully, move to the side as Zhune and the cop advance past me. The Djinn's hands are in his pockets. Whoever shows up first will down hard. Unless it's the Cherub, who we want alive. But they have reason to believe she's someone we want the most dead, which might be enough to have them send out someone else to negotiate.

There's a brief and hissed conversation from behind the dumpsters near the end of the alley. If they break and run now, we can see them from here. I probably can't hit accurately at that distance, not with this imprecise rifle: Zhune and the cop can. "Step out with your hands up!" shouts our current pet mortal. I like him better than the last one. He doesn't seem terrified.

It looks like Sean's the one who drew the short straw, because he's the one who steps out, hands up as requested. "There's been a mistake, officer," he says smoothly. If he were an Impudite, he'd even have a decent chance of confusing the matter. He walks forward slowly, hands still raised. "Look, I can explain. We were the ones who put in the call about this place."

"He's trying to distract you," Zhune says quietly. "While the sniper gets into position. Take him down now."

The Mercurian dives for cover when the shooting starts, not fast enough to avoid taking a hit. Which is when the Cherub and Malakite show up, the former pointing at me. About time she appeared. I back away slowly, waiting for them to get closer. If I waste every dart on bad shots, we'll never pull this off.

Sean's running now, the cop in hot pursuit, while Zhune takes his gun, considers the two angels still standing. Here, Cherub, Cherub, Cherub. Ignore him and chase _me_. I pick up my pace, though not by much. You don't want to pay attention to him. Or leave the Malakite to deal with him, Zhune can do kneecaps. Come follow your attuned while you're the only one who can see me.

"Out of our way," says the Cherub warily. I suspect she's not shooting him yet because she believes we have some clever plan that would keep him from being shot if she tried it. Beyond Zhune being fairly tough, I don't think we covered that. The human shield was supposed to stay in front of him.

"Am I obstructing justice again?" Zhune asks. I can't see his face from this angle, but I can hear his voice, and dammit, he's playing. This is not the time. "Sorry about that. Except you keep trying to take something that's _mine_. I thought theft was our job, not Judgment's."

"This is the last warning I'll give you," says the Cherub, the Malakite statue-still beside her. "Out of our way."

Zhune shakes his head, and I'll bet he's grinning at them. "I'll arm-wrestle you for her," he offers. "Best two of three."

The Cherub's expression is very much one of "screw this." But she only shrugs, and says, "Joe?"

"Let justice be done," says the Malakite, in a voice too strange and deep to be his own. He raises his hand. Disturbance rolls like thunder, then lightning flickers between the angels and Zhune in the alleyway. There's a sword in the Malakite's hand, silver and bright. The angel makes no move, but the sword slips out of his hand, straight as a bullet towards my partner.

Well. This isn't good.

I turn the other way to run, even as Zhune drops a newly-bleeding vessel to be his own celestial self. I've never seen Heavenly Judgment in action before, but I've heard it doesn't stop until you get to your Heart. If they ever turn that one on me, I am so dead. Behind me, Zhune snarls, and there's more disturbance as he abandons me for Hell. I can't blame him, but this is not convenient. 

"She's getting away," snaps the Cherub, pointing in my direction, and now that I'm outnumbered again they're finally chasing me. Great. The sword shivers in mid-air, disappears in another lightning-flash, while I edge backwards. They're not shooting yet. I'm not sure that's a good sign. Can they do that to me if they can't see me? I don't know. I can't jump to my Heart.

"I'll give you the same chance as before," the Cherub says, looking at--not precisely at me, but within half a foot, which is close enough that heavy fire would make me unhappy. "Give up now, and we'll offer you a fair trial and chance to repent."

How generous of them. I wonder when Zhune's coming back. He wouldn't abandon me to Judgment. I think. I move closer to them, watch the Cherub for signs of shooting.

"If you don't say anything, I'm going to take that as rejection of the terms," the Cherub says. She backs up a few steps. I'm not sure I can get close enough to shoot accurately without getting shot at myself. "Fine. Joe?"

The Malakite hums a tune I know well, and vanishes. The blackwing has Ethereal Form too? That's just not fair.

Nor is the part where the Cherub stays well out of the range I can confidently fire this stupid rifle from. If I move, I make noise. If I _don't_ move, he can sweep the indicated area until we bump into each other. If I live through this, I'm going to ask Zhune to teach me the Song of Thunder.

I can't hear the Malakite moving. This is not good. What am I supposed to do, wait until he grabs me and _then_ try to shoot him?

"It's not going to work," says the Cherub, distantly. "We'll catch you if you stay on Earth. You can't return to Hell without dying here. You should have taken our offer. It would have been easier on you."

Faster, I'm sure. Easier, no. They don't get permission to screw with my head just because they believe it's for my own good. Fine, time to run and see which angel's faster than the other. I turn my back to the Cherub who still isn't shooting--

Clip the side of the Malakite I can't see with one elbow. I duck down, end up with a hand in my hair instead of hitting me in the chest, keep the rifle out of reach while he wraps his other arm around me and we both go _down_ , hitting the ground while he tries to grab at what he can't see but only feel, while I try to pull far enough away to have space to shoot. I can't aim in the middle of flailing, not with the Malakite this much heavier than I am and doing his best to throw that weight on top of me. It's easy for him to pin my legs and still get a hand around my throat. I want a larger vessel next time.

A bullet cracks through my right shoulder, enough to make me yelp. The Malakite shifts on top of me, only one hand on my throat, weight on my legs, one hand on the gun that, fuck, that was right leg, that _hurt_ , but he has all limbs busy and though I'm beginning to see stars from lack of oxygen, I do know right where his torso is. I swing my weapon around awkwardly, fire. Hear the tiny smack of the needle going in. I hope that got through his jacket. I hope he falls unconscious before I do, because my vision's starting to go and there's the Cherub out of range, waiting. 

I can hear more shooting, but I'm not sure if it's distant or only sounds distant. The hand around my throat is--getting weaker, or I'm not feeling it anymore. This isn't fair. I came up with a decent plan and gave it a good try. They're not supposed to win.

I remember what the Marches looked like. Silver sand and fog. I was happy there.

"Leo?"

"Mrf." What I meant to say, was, Zhune, where have you been? I pry open my eyes. "Ow."

"Can you walk? We need to move." He's crouched over me, looking at me directly enough that I guess Ethereal Form has worn off. I don't think I was out for long.

"I don't know." I take his hand, stagger to my feet. "...that should be worse." I can see the place where the bullet went through my leg, a bloody red hole, and it's painful, but not so much that I can't walk on that leg. "Getting shot usually hurts more than this."

"You're used to having a cheap vessel that can't take damage," Zhune says. By the look of it, he took a few bullets himself; his shirt is, once again, red and shredded, though his jacket looks fine. From the front; when he turns around I can see one hole in the back. "I can carry the Cherub, but the police will be back. My Servant can only distract them for so long."

"Right." I take in the scene: one unconscious presumed-Malakite lying near me, fairly undamaged. One Ofanite still curled up next to the dumpster a few yards back. And the Cherub on the ground, eyes closed, bloody but breathing. "Knocked her out?"

"Kept her distracted long enough to get the rifle and get in a shot," Zhune says, lifting her up in his arms. "Kill the evidence, would you? Even if they know what your vessel looks like, let's not get your vessel's fingerprints floating around Judgment files."

I find the tranq rifle on the ground. Empty. "How many shots did you take before you hit her?"

"Can you shoot precisely with a gun in each hand? While trying _not_ to be killed by an angry Cherub? Besides, the aim on that thing sucks."

"True." It takes me two tries to get my resonance to work on the weapon, crumbling it down until it's fragments of metal and plastic. Between Trauma, Thunder, and being choked, I'm getting used to the headaches. Then I limp after Zhune, leaving a trail of bloody footprints behind me. "What happened to the Mercurian?"

"He slipped the monkey and doubled back," Zhune says. "Took enough bullets that I could drop him by the time he caught up. I think he's behind the last dumpster."

"Dead?"

"Not quite. Angels appearing in Trauma might alert more of Judgment. I feel judged enough for the day." Zhune drops the Cherub on the ground with a thud as we reach the car we left in the parking lot. There are two cruisers with flashing lights not far away, but no one in evidence near them. That's not going to last. "I need more ammo. I wasn't packing for full-blown combat. And that Mercurian took an amazing amount of lead before he dropped." He looks back to me as he opens the trunk. "If you think it's a better idea, I can go kill him."

"No, so long as he's unconscious." Let him have to deal with the awkward explanations. "Did he see you take the Cherub down?"

Zhune heaves the body into the trunk, arranges it briskly. Then snaps on handcuffs that he appropriated from my jacket at some point. It would be nice if I got to keep those, later. It's not often I get to hang onto stolen artifacts from Judgment, of all Words. Nearly as satisfying as swiping them from the Game. "I don't believe so. I caught him coming up before he had a chance to see what had happened. But it's possible."

"We'd better hurry."

"You're not driving with that leg. Door's open." Zhune slams the trunk shut, and frowns at me. "Those are some bruises on your neck. If you have the Essence handy, I'll get you fixed. I'm nearly out, and that's after getting a loan while I was in Stygia. Playing musical chairs with attuned is not cheap."

I nearly fall into the passenger seat of the car. "I'll live. The vessel's tough. Let's save the Essence for trying to get through to our Prince. Or other upcoming emergencies. If she wakes up before we arrive--"

"I can take her," Zhune says. He gets into the car, reaches out to touch my neck lightly. It still hurts. "You couldn't have shot him before he knocked you out?"

"I _did_ shoot him before he knocked me out. What, did you think I managed it while unconscious? It just took a while to work through his system." I want to curl up someplace warm with a cold beer and remote control. Unfortunately, what I'm about to do is try to invoke my Prince, and hope he likes the gift-wrapped Cherub enough to not kill me for interrupting him in the midst of whatever it is Princes do. Delegate, so far as I can tell.

Zhune manages to leave the parking lot without hitting any cars. Probably because there are only two others in there, and the big flashing lights make them easy to avoid. "This will go fine," he says. "Wait and see. Try not to stress over it."

"This isn't stress. This is terror." I rub my face, and discover my shoulder's bled on my hands. "I could use a shower."

"Do we have the time?"

With an unconscious Cherub in the back trunk, a Mercurian who might realize what's happening when he wakes up, two more angels who'll be waking up with him... "No," I say, "we don't have the time. Let's get this over with."

"You sound so excited," says Zhune, not unsympathetically. "Try to remember he's on our side."

I pull my leg up on my lap, and poke at the bullet hole there. "No, he isn't. We're on his."


	14. In Which Introductions Are Made

The Cherub is starting to twitch. I crouch down to see if she's waking up, or only moving in her sleep. Her eyes aren't open. "You couldn't have saved _one_ dart for later?"

"Shut up, Leo." Zhune shoves a couch out of the way of the area he's clearing in the center of the floor. "You could show more gratitude for the part where I came back and saved you from Judgment."

"Don't get me wrong, I appreciate that." I take a seat on the couch, wincing at the way my shoulder and leg both protest. "Hurts less" isn't the same as "doesn't hurt," even with a tougher vessel. There's blood all over the living room of...whoever it is we're borrowing a house from. If they want to file a complaint, they can show up and make it in person. "It's this part right here that's making me nervous. We could still shoot her and run. If we keep taking out the Cherub, they might stop sending her after me."

"Or they might whip up an artifact that lets her pass the tracking of the attunement to someone else, and send a squad of Malakim after you," Zhune says. He stands in the center of the room, only more roguishly handsome for having taken off his bloody shirt. So the Djinn can get shot, and still look good. I haven't dared to check a mirror yet, but I'm thinking that I can't pull off two bullet wounds and a neck covered in bruises with nearly as much flair. So much for my good leather jacket.

"I don't like it."

"It's not a matter of liking it," Zhune says patiently. "It's a matter of necessity. If you have a better plan, tell me now. Otherwise, we're working on a tight time limit."

I leave another bloody smear when I rub my face. It's nearly dry now, leaving me feeling sticky and desperately in need of a shower. I hate looking like this. Being a Calabite may mean being scruffy, but not that I have to be filthy. "No. I don't have a better plan. I am completely out of plans. How much Essence do you want for the call?"

"How much do you have left?"

"Seven." And it's nowhere near sunset. "Will that be enough?"

"That's nine between us." He steps over to me, offers a hand. "Should be fine. That's a lot of Essence to get someone's attention."

"Someone we spoke to less than a week ago." The meeting feels further away than that. It's been a long day. I take his hand, and pass over all the Essence I have left. Nothing more for Songs or desperate measures. "If he's in a bad mood when he shows... It was nice knowing you."

Zhune pats me on the shoulder. Not the one that was shot. It's a small consideration, but I know Djinn who would do otherwise, because they could. "Thanks. But we'll get through this okay."

I have my doubts, but nod to him, and curl up on the couch while Zhune begins the ritual. Maybe Valefor won't show up in person. Not all Superiors choose to walk into the room, especially for a matter as small as this. All we need is the attunement broken. That's all. Then we can run fast, as Servitors of Theft are known for, and keep moving until we're given another job.

It's a good thing we're doing this in the living room rather than the bedroom. My dignity's shot as it is today without hiding under the bed.

I don't recognize all the words coming from Zhune, as he murmurs out Helltongue requesting the presence of our Prince. Some of it's archaic variations on words I know, and some is so mutated I don't know what words they came from. Or...what words they turned into. The ritual he's chosen is not only older than I am, it may be older than he is.

Zhune sends the blast of Essence off, a rattle that'll alert anyone on the same block. Which is why we got some distance from where we left the other angels before trying this. On the floor, the Cherub makes a small noise. I pull myself to my feet. Proper respect for the Prince if he chooses to show. I hope he doesn't show. All he has to do is take a look at the situation from afar, and yank the attunement.

Or he might show up after all.

My Prince looks the same as he did the last time I saw him on the corporeal: elegant and dangerous, entirely confident in his smile. "Didn't I just send the two of you off?" he says, and flops down in a recliner, feet up on the coffee table. "I could have sworn you stopped by a few days ago." He puts his hands behind his head, looks back and forth between me and Zhune. "What do you have to show me?"

Zhune reaches into his jacket, pulls out a sheet of paper. "One receipt for the delivery of two signed contracts, as requested." He pokes the Cherub's bound wrists with his foot. "One set of handcuffs borrowed from a triad of Judgment." Rolls her over until she's one her back, eyes starting to open. The disturbance of a Superior appearing on the corporeal must have been enough to wake her. "One Cherub of Judgment, slightly damaged. Sorry about that. The acquisition could have gone more smoothly."

"Saving the best for last?" Valefor laughs, and stands up to take a look. "Zhune, you really know how to keep a tradition going. Or maybe you only learn from experience." He reaches down to pull the Cherub to her feet. She's less steady on her feet than I am with my leg shot, and staggers in the Prince's grip. "Tell me this was your idea."

"My idea," Zhune says, taking credit or blame for the invocation as warranted. "Leo's the one who worked out how to pull it off." He gives me far more credit than I deserve for a plan that ran through every contingency plan attached to it before people began calling down swords of justice. "We have a little problem."

"I'm not sure I would call having this kitty attuned to you a little problem," Valefor says, turning towards me. She sways in his hands, held out at arm's length like a jacket he hasn't decided yet to put on or throw back in the closet. "A problem that makes you ineffective on the corporeal except as bait isn't so little. Can you think of a better term for it?"

I stare back at him. There's a reason I never mentioned this lingering attunement earlier. I wonder if he can tell how long it's been attached to me. "Liability?"

Brilliant smile. Flashier than an Impudite's. "That's the word I wanted. Liability." He shakes the Cherub. "Wakey, wakey. Let's see if you have any input."

The Cherub's eyes snap open, wide and frightened. I'd find it funnier if I weren't feeling much the same. "Let me go," she snarls, trying to pull away, her hands yanking at the handcuffs behind her. "In the name of Judgment--"

"Not a bright one, is she?" He lets go, and the Cherub collapses into a heap on the ground, staring up at him. None of us can look anywhere else in the room, so long as he feels like holding our attention. "But the real deal." The Prince leaves her on the floor, turning back to Zhune and me. "You do know how to bring me the fun presents. I think the kitten has been spending too much time stuck in boring Judge duties, and she could use a vacation." To the Cherub on the floor, "What do you think?"

"Go to hell," she croaks, trying to crawl backwards.

"Before a proper introduction?" He pulls her back up, white teeth bright in his smile. "The name's Valefor. Pleased to meet you. And you?"

"Hakupha," she whispers. She's not trying to get away anymore. I don't think I'd be able to move either, under the circumstances.

"That's more like it. Hakupha, kitten, I like your plan. Let's go." My Prince snaps his fingers. The room lurches around me, the lights receding.

We're on a narrow street between crooked buildings. The sky above is rock, shadowed in the distance. The pain from my wounds is gone, and Zhune stands beside me, for an instant a mass of things I don't want to see before he's himself again.

Valefor pats a black-maned lion on the head, and gives us all a wicked grin. A black-maned lion with tawny wings, who gazes up at him with wide, adoring eyes. She glows in this dim light. "Welcome to Stygia," says the Prince. There's a sparkling ribbon with floppy pink bow around her neck, attached to a long stretch of ribbon he holds in one hand.

He looks over his shoulder as he heads down the street, Cherub trotting at his side. "Come on, boys," he says. "Don't waste time staring. Haven't you ever seen a Cherub before?"

And there's nothing I can do but follow.


	15. An Interlude, In Which People Are Probably Happier Not Knowing

Sean woke up sprawled out on a motel bed. The first thing he noticed was that his chest felt like it had been shot a dozen times. The second thing he noticed was that his shirt was missing.

He sat up slowly. It still hurt. On the second bed, Ruhamah lay still, eyes closed. The Ofanite was breathing. "Is he going to be okay?" Sean asked, looking for someone...mobile. The Malakite, sitting at a desk with Ruhamah's laptop open. All he got in response was a curt nod. "Oh. Good. Where's the Cherub?" A shrug. Sean took in the Malakite's lack of injury. "Is that an I don't know where the body is anymore shrug, a she ran off after Leo and hasn't been seen since shrug, or an I got hit by the tranqs too and when I woke up she wasn't there shrug?"

"The third," said Joe.

"Oh. Great." Sean gingerly set both feet on the floor, then tried to stand up. So long as he kept holding onto something, it seemed to work. "I don't suppose you know how to sing Corporeal Healing?" A head shake. "It was worth asking. Where's my shirt?"

The Malakite pointed towards the bathroom.

"Thanks. I guess." Sean staggered in that direction, using the desk chair as a crutch on the way. And as an excuse to look over the Malakite's shoulder at the computer screen, not that there was much to see with the page scrolled down until only a few lines at the top appeared.

_of the Sword as instructed. Upon the advice of Ruhamah, we voted to engage the subject after a period of movement, to avoid the potential for fatal or disruptive traps. (See linked file from previous encounter with the target.) Movement was detected at 8:13 this morning. At this time_

Nothing he couldn't have worked out on his own. Sean moved on, trying out phrases in his head for when someone who would _say_ things woke up. Who thought it was a good idea to send the Mercurian after the human? Oh, so you think just because I'm a Mercurian I can talk down a charmed mortal who's trying to kill me? I would think that a Cherub and Malakite left in a quiet alley with a combat-ineffective Calabite and one other demon could come up with a way to not lose both of them. It would have been nice if while you were running after Leo someone could have distracted her partner so that I didn't get shot more. Seriously, was Judgment trying to screw this up on purpose, or just incompetent?

No, that last one might be going too far. Depending on whether or not the Cherub came back with a Calabite in tow. Sean sat down on the floor in the bathroom, head resting against the cold tile of the wall. He shouldn't have let them convince him to pull the human away. If Hakupha dragged Leo back at this point, he'd have no way to "accidentally" take the Calabite out in the middle of a firefight. Trying to call his Archangel would be an over-reaction to the amount of information Leo was carrying around, and might prompt investigation from Judgment. Unless Leo could be persuaded to ask for redemption from Michael rather than being handed to the hyenas, but how likely was that? And there was the lingering possibility that Leo did have some vital piece of information Sean no longer knew about, enough to justify an invocation.

No, if that were the case, War would have sent its own retrieval squad as soon as Sean reported contact with the demon six months back. Sean pulled himself up far enough to dig through the pile of bloody clothing in the tub. One of these days, he'd have to learn Celestial Tongues so that he could call in for advice in a situation like this. A Vassal wasn't supposed to need to check in for instructions, but the situation had gone strange around the time Leo became part of it. Worse than strange with Judgment withholding information and trying to keep him from doing his job.

The shirt was a complete loss. The jacket would draw attention from the bullet holes, but it still held together well enough for him to pull it on, check the contents for weaponry. Maybe he could shoot Leo if the Cherub dragged her in, make a quick claim that he had suspected foul play, and run. By the time they caught up with him he might have a plausible defense ready.

It took longer than he liked any Servitor of Judgment to see, for him to make his way back to the other room and a place to sit. "Next time," he said, lying down carefully on the bed, "let's remove the Djinn first. _Then_ take our time going after Leo."

"Yeah," sighed the Ofanite. Ruhamah's eyes were open, though they weren't focusing on anything. "Djinn?"

"I don't think an Impudite or Balseraph would have been able to convince that human to chase me so aggressively," Sean said, rolling over onto his side to face the Judge on the other bed. "Though Habbalite is a distant possibility. That man would _not_ listen to reason. Or stop shooting at me. It took me a while to ditch him."

The Ofanite blinked. "Diss'nant?"

It took a moment for him to follow what the Judge was saying. "Oh! No. Standing orders to separate innocent humans from combat situations involving hostile forces. I ran, he followed. It worked."

"Good," Ruhamah said. "Smart." He flopped over on his face, mumbled something into the blankets.

"Yeah, you and me both." Sean put fingers to his chest, found the holes still oozing. "He was a good shot."

Joe walked into view, and lifted Ruhamah up. Then returned to the desk, once the Ofanite was propped up in a sitting position.

"Cherub?"

"I don't know. Presumably still chasing Leo. Though if both of you were knocked out, and the Djinn shot me, the odds aren't looking good for her." Sean pulled out a gun, checked how much ammunition was left. "I know I hit the Djinn twice before I went down. Maybe three times. She could have finished him off, and... would she keep chasing Leo if both of you were down and out?" No need to ask if they would have left him behind if he'd been the only one unconscious.

"Maybe," the Ofanite said. Thought it over. "Depends. On if she thought she was close."

"So we don't know if she's in hot pursuit, or in Trauma."

"No." Ruhamah pulled himself straighter, scrubbed at his eyes. "Damn. Brain _fuzzy_. Anyone called? To check? Her Heart. If Leo has my handcuffs, I can track her, with enough Essence."

"I only just woke up," Sean said, and looked to the Malakite. "Joe?" A head shake. "So maybe it's time to call, and find out if she needs backup." Somewhere in the distance, a burst of disturbance let itself be heard. Sean blinked, trying to pick out the cause of that much noise. "Or maybe she caught up--"

"Superior!" Ruhamah put out a hand urgently. "Joe, phone!"

"Oh," Sean said, as a cell phone landed on the bed beside the Ofanite. And stayed quiet as Ruhamah scrambled to get it open and a number dialed. Maybe he didn't have to worry about keeping Leo out of Judgment's hands after all.


	16. In Which Bad Things Happen

It's the brightest place I've seen in Stygia. Inside the bar, the lights have all been turned up, until there's not a dark corner to hide in. Right when I want one. I've been introduced to three Wordbound and a Baron, all of whom are more interested in watching Valefor play with his new pet than they are in me. Lucky me.

"You need a beer," Zhune tells me. He's found us a place to sit back by the wall; the bar is packed, but somehow there's always enough room that none of the demons in here are stepping on each other's toes. Tentacles. Tails. If I spread my wings, I'd probably smack a Distincted demon in the nose.

"I'm fine." Even if she weren't fawning over a Prince, I'd be able to pick the Cherub out of the crowd. There might be Djinn who'd have similar forms if viewed from some angle, there are demons of Fire who glow, but she looks _wrong_ here. Angels don't belong in Hell, and even from the corner of my eye she stands out in the middle of the demons like a pyramid in Boise.

From where I'm sitting, I can only make out parts of the conversation. "I work for Judgment," she explains to a Balseraph, in a clear, earnest voice. "I don't steal things. It's wrong."

"Except that you tried to swipe my Calabite," says the Prince holding her leash. He thinks it's funny. Everyone in this bar but me thinks it's _hilarious_ , except for the demonlings with trays who look worried that the big bad Cherub will bite their heads off if they get too close. "You don't think that's a contradiction?"

Hakupha's face wrinkles as she tries to think through Superior-level Habbalite fuzz on her brain. I know what the ordinary version feels like. All my brain dribbling out my ears while I stare at someone I adore and know every answer I can come up with will be the wrong one. "The Most Holy told us to," she says. "So it's all right."

He laughs at her, right in the middle of that sappy smile she's giving him. "As long as Dominic says so, it's all good?"

"...yes?"

"That clears things up." He spins the Cherub around to face the Balseraph again. "Tell the kitten a few stories. It sounds like they never let her out for fun when Nicky's holding her leash."

Zhune takes my head in both hands, turns it to look at him. So long as I'm not looking at his true form, I'm okay with this. "Sure you don't need a drink?"

"I'm fine."

"Because you're looking a little unsettled."

"I'm fine."

"And you're repeating the same thing every time I speak to you, whether or not it applies to what I said."

"I'm fine."

"Right," he says, and snags a passing imp by its rhinestone-studded collar. "You. Get us some drinks." It nods, and scurries off, despite having received neither payment ahead of time nor more specific instructions. I don't know if it's that type of bar, or a matter of having walked in here behind the Prince of Theft.

Probably the latter. There's a cluster of demons all around Valefor and his new pet, but now that I look for it, I can see demons trying to sidle up near Zhune and me as well. They're the smaller ones in the bar, not important enough to rate attention from their Prince. Abruptly, I realize that Zhune's been keeping them out of my face for the last half hour. I'm not happy about needing a Djinn bodyguard. But as long as he's around, I might as well take advantage of it. "Zhune?"

"Hmm?" He turns away from a Lilim he's been warding off.

"How long do you think this will go on?"

"Until he gets bored," Zhune says. "Don't ask me how long that takes." He glares a hopeful Shedite out of the way long enough for the imp to get back with two shot glasses of I don't know what. The Djinn picks up his drink. "What's in this?"

"I have no idea," I say, "but it tasted okay." Shots are meant to be slammed. I'm usually more the sort to hunch over a series of beers for three hours, but today is a day for trying new things. Like hanging out with a Prince. This is a foreign concept to me. Belial and Baal do not hang out with Servitors, except in the sense of taking time to personally disassemble one. While I appreciate the lack of death on my part, I have the feeling this bar-hopping tactic is not a sign of a warmer, kinder Prince so much as a different approach to spreading terror among one's employees.

The Cherub is trying to cuddle a Shedite, who curls around her and plays with her mane. "I like you," Hakupha says, eyes wide and shining. "You should come home with me. You could work for _my_ Archangel."

The Shedite snickers. "And give up my Word and Prince? I don't think so, darling. Why don't you stay here with us?" It leaves streaks of slime in her fur, winding closer. "We could have fun."

"My friends would worry," Hakupha responds. She has to think about it first. Brain turned to goo. "And the Most Holy might too."

"Even though you're having so much fun here?" The Shedite nibbles on her ear with sharp yellow teeth. "They're such spoilsports."

"Not too much fun," Valefor says, "or Andre will ask why I didn't invite him." He pulls the Cherub back onto his lap, the Shedite drawing back as if it's been pointedly dismissed. "Kitten, let's not have anyone worrying about you. Why don't you call your daddy and let him know we're taking good care of you?"

"I don't know that Song," Hakupha says, nuzzling up under my Prince's chin. "Do you think he's worried?"

He taps her on the nose. "You can call. A little present from me. Let him know you're fine."

"Okay!" Essence pings as the Cherub sends a message to, presumably, the Archangel of Judgment. "I did that."

"Good," says Valefor. "Now you can stay with us longer." He slides down from where he's been sitting, and snaps his fingers in the direction of me and Zhune. It doesn't require a verbal command for us to work out that we should be scrambling after him, and caught up by the time he walks out the door of the bar.

The street outside is deserted, dim, and quiet. But onlookers crowd the dark alleys and windows, everyone from the demons to the damned watching our Prince take a Cherub for a walk. He smiles at one of the alleys as we pass, a narrow gap filled with cowering, fascinated damned souls. "What do you think of those?" he asks the Cherub, with an idle gesture. "Any lingering urge to save the humans?"

She blinks up at him. "They're damned," she says. "That's why they're here. It's...justice."

"That's what I love about you, kitten. You understand how these things work." He scratches her behind the ears. "You're the closest those souls will ever get to seeing an angel. Wave to the damned, kitten."

She waves one golden paw to them, then hurries to catch up with her love before he can get too far ahead, or the ribbon can start to tug.

That's Theft for you. There's always something left to steal, even from people who don't have a single material possession to their name. We're stealing any hope these souls had left, of rescue or redemption. It's always been too late for them, but now they're _sure_ , as the Cherub fawns over a Prince of Hell.

The door Valefor turns towards opens in front of him, to a darker bar than last time. Not a bar, I correct, once we get inside. More of a casino, if smaller than the infamous establishments of Greed and the Game. Zhune hesitates in the door, only long enough to put him behind me as we step aside. Throughout the room, demons turn towards the entrance, then return quickly to what they were focusing on before. The Prince may want to make an entrance in style, but it's not good to be caught staring.

"Zhune," says the Prince, "you're good at card games. Teach the kitten how to play blackjack." The leash drops into the Djinn's hands, and Valefor gives me a brief glance. "I'm sure Leo can amuse himself while you're busy."

My partner nods, face bland. So I'm not the only one unhappy with this turn of events. The three of them move away, leaving me just inside and very much alone. Oh. Great. This is an improvement.

"Hey," says a vaguely familiar voice behind me. I drag my eyes off Prince, Cherub, and partner to follow the voice, and see the Impudite who was gaming on the floor of Valefor's waiting room. He smiles at me, points to an empty chair at his table. "Do you play poker?"

I take in the other people at the table: the Lilim in a patchwork skirt he was playing with the last time I saw him, long black hair hiding most of her face; a gangly Habbalite with piercings that loop between his skin and the leather straps of his clothing; a murky gray Shedite with two eyes focused on me, one on its cards, and the rest on the angel across the room. "I've never played," I say.

"The rules are easy," he says, and kicks a chair my way. "We're playing Texas Hold 'em. Two cards dealt to each player, round of betting. There's a three card flop in the middle, another round of betting, one more card is the turn, betting, final card is the river, betting, and then it's based on the best hand you can make out of your cards and the shared ones in the middle. Simple. You know the hand hierarchy?"

"High card through royal flush, sure." I haven't moved yet. There are demons making their nonchalant way towards me from various directions. "I don't have any cash on me."

"I can loan you a few chips," offers the Lilim. If I sit down, it'll put me directly between the Lilim and the Impudite. Not a place I want to be. On the other hand, compared to the Shedite behind me who's starting to get close enough to stick something in my pockets, it might not be the worst choice I could make, to sit down.

"No thanks."

The Lilim smiles up at me, her chin resting in one hand. "Oh, I wouldn't _geas_ you. But if you're not sure you can pay me back... I'll give you a stack of chips. Whenever you get up from the table, I get half of whatever's still in front of you, and you can keep the rest. No other obligations. How does that sound?"

Like there's a hidden catch I haven't spotted yet. Except that from the way the Habbalite is looking at her, it might not be _my_ problem. I sit down at the waiting chair. The Lilim slides a stack of chips in front of me, an even half of what's been sitting in front of her. "I'm game if you are," I say, and put on a charming smile. "Deal me in."

I fold the first four hands shortly after the ante, to watch how the others play. The Habbalite's aggressive in his betting, the Shedite downright timid, the other two harder to follow. On the fifth hand I follow the Lilim up through the final card, and end up beating her three of a kind with a full house. Simple enough. No one bothers with table conversation.

People are laughing at the other side of the room. I'm glad my back is to them. I catch a moment of Zhune's voice--"No, the ace can be one _or_ eleven, it's decided in favor of the person it's dealt to"--before he's swallowed up in the noise again. Meanwhile, despite my indifferent play style, the stack in front of me is growing. First hypothesis based on the evidence at hand: the Lilim is finding it easier to cheat in my favor without getting caught than on her own behalf. I've lost count of the hands, but my stack of chips is now twice as large as it was when she passed it to me.

I'm holding a two and four, off-suit, while the flop has two red kings and the nine of clubs. "Fold," I say, and kick the dinky Calabite behind me who's trying to sneak a folded letter into my pocket. She scuttles back, neither offended nor apologetic.

"They're going to keep trying for as long as you're trailing behind the Boss," the Impudite tells me cheerfully, and throws a matching bet into the center of the table. "So what did you do? Kidnap a Cherub?"

"More or less." Let's not talk about the how and why of it right now.

"Cherub of Judgment," clarifies the Shedite, who's been paying more attention to what's going on across the room. "Do you think it would help if I tried that?"

"Repetition is boring," says the Lilim, and flips out the fourth card. "Come up with your own presents if you don't want to look like a copy-cat. Once is entertaining, twice is interesting, three times and you get dinged for lack of personal style."

"Unless the same person does it every time," says the Impudite. "Then it's _personal_ style. You can get away with trademark moves." He's speaking to the Shedite, but I get the feeling the explanation is aimed more at me. The hand finishes, and I find I was smart to get out early and avoid four kings from the Habbalite.

The Lilim passes the deck to her left, which means it's my turn to deal again. "There is a fine line," she says, "between trademark style and getting in a rut. Ideally, one has a broad range of abilities that can apply to multiple situations."

"Nothing wrong with specializing," says the Impudite. He takes a look at the cards I've dealt him, and adds, "What do you think, Leo?"

I shrug, examine my own cards. King of hearts, queen of hearts. It's a start strong enough to bet on in the first round. "I haven't been working for Theft long enough to have formed a strong opinion. What do most people do?"

"Most people specialize," says the Impudite. "The name's Benjamin, by the way. You should come by to play more often. Your luck's been good."

Or someone's been giving me good luck. In Stygia, I know which is likely. The Lilim folds before the bets have finished. I deal out the flop: jack of spades, jack of hearts, nine of hearts. I'm one card away from a flush, and two from a straight. "I don't get back to Hell often," I say. This is the first time I've managed it without Trauma. If it requires a Prince to yank me through the planes against my Discord, I'd as soon not have it happen again.

"Pity," says Benjamin. He raises heavily, enough to make me doubt my chances with this hand until I remember it's not my money I'm betting. The Habbalite raises again, the Shedite folds as usual, and I call. The pile in the center grows for two more raises before we're all content to call. "What's your current focus? Or are you a generalist?"

I deal out another card. Ten of hearts. I have my flush, and there's a good chance someone else has a straight. A hasty review of poker hands says that puts me ahead. "Tethers, I suppose. Or does everyone get half their assignments in that direction?"

"Not most people," says the Lilim. "Ben, if you keep raising--"

"I'm out, I'm out." The Impudite folds. "A Tether specialty is a good place for promotion. It's also a good place for ending up dead. You're into the high stakes, high risk games?"

I deal out the fifth card to the center of the table. Nine of hearts. I'm sitting on a royal flush. "My partner is. I just try to get the job done." I'm not looking for promotions, or attention, or anything short of being left alone. Funny how I never manage that. I could try to be competent but dull, except for fear that Theft considers boring the same as incompetent. Doing my best was beaten into me early on, and it's not a habit I'm unlearning soon.

The Habbalite raises, and I look down at my stack of chips. I have exactly enough left to call. The stakes are up to five times what I started with, and I'm holding a royal flush. Meanwhile, the Lilim plays with a bracelet on her wrist, ignoring me.

I set my cards face-down in front of me. "I fold."

The Habbalite coughs, and leans in on his elbows. "You can't fold!"

I blink at him, a picture of innocence. "It's against the rules? I thought I could fold any time it's my turn up until all bets are settled."

"You have enough to call," says the Punisher, pulling out of his chair as he reaches across the table. "Look, you have four blue chips left--"

"He folded already," says Benjamin, sounding amused. "You can't change your mind after you declare a fold. It throws off the flow of things."

"He can't just _fold_ on--"

"You don't know what he's folding on," says the Lilim sweetly, and taps her dead cards beside the ones in the center. "You won. Take the pot so that Ben can deal the next hand, before I get bored."

The Habbalite shrinks back from her. "Right," he says, and pulls the chips towards him. "Lucky me." I'm not sure what's going on, and I don't want to know.

Back at the far side of the room, Zhune's trailing along behind Valefor, the Cherub's leash out of his hands again. "Time for me to go," I say, and present the Lilim with two blue chips. "As agreed, my end of the bargain."

She takes the chips I offer while watching the Habbalite. "Too bad your luck didn't hold," she says, sounding not at all displeased.

"It never does." I stand up, and find my way over to the people I'm supposed to follow before they get to the door. The last two chips drop into the hands of damned soul by the door. I'd rather not hold gifts with invisible strings.

Out in the street, Valefor loops the ribbon over one hand, throws an arm over Zhune's shoulders. "Tell me, Stalker, where do you think we should take the kitten next? Drinking and games are a start, but we need more entertainment."

"I don't like _him_ ," Hakupha says, glowering at the Djinn who's taking the Prince's attention away from her. It takes a Habbalite-fried brain to believe that's a turn for the worse. "Why does he get to choose?"

"Because he knows Stygia better than you do," Valefor explains, and pats the Cherub on the head. "Zhune?"

"The Silver Scale," Zhune says. 

I've never heard of the place, but that makes our Prince chuckle. "How traditional. You haven't been there in centuries, have you?"

"It's out of my price range," Zhune replies, bland and respectful. "But I recall the floor show. It might hold a Cherub's attention."

"I like the way you think," Valefor says. That sounds like a compliment and threat simultaneously. "Silver Scale it is. Let's take the shortcut." He snaps his fingers--does Theft mandate a sense of the dramatic, or is it just our Prince?--and this time I'm ready for the world changing around us. Even if my stomach isn't.

Gilded pillars support an arched ceiling, all of it overdone with scrollwork and murals. A moment of cognitive dissonance, when I recognize the murals: they're all Michelangelo paintings, from his Sistine Chapel frescoes to The Last Judgment, with every human or human-shaped figure replaced with a different Balseraph. A Balseraph-Christ solemnly presenting a set of keys to Balseraph-Peter puts the art history class I took in a completely different perspective.

Damned souls in neat uniforms stand straight on either side of the doors at the end of the room. The gleam over the top of the door resolves itself as we approach into a silver relief of a blindfolded Balseraph, a set of measuring scales clutched in its teeth. "Shiny," says the Cherub, pointing upwards. "What's inside?"

"More fun," says Valefor. The doors swing open before him, the humans to either side dropping down on their knees at his approach. "Lead the way, kitten."

We step inside with the Cherub at the front. She stops, sits up with her wings fluffing up behind her, to look over the room. "I don't know anyone here," she says. Neither do I. This place is the polar opposite of Teef's dingy tavern, a shining place too gaudy to be elegant, and full of demons more powerful than I am. Despite the room we stepped through, there's only a small door behind us, and all the walls here are glass. We're at the top of a mountain in Stygia, looking down over the crags and valleys of the Principality.

A Balseraph with gleaming silver scales streams towards us, coiling in front of our Lord with his head low. "Prince Valefor," he says, wings spread about him. I notice he doesn't say, my Prince. "What's your pleasure today?"

"To bring my guests here and show them the pit," Valefor says. "Arguros, meet Hakupha. She asked to see the sights of Stygia, and it wouldn't have been a real tour without stopping here."

"Pleased to meet you," says the Cherub, uncertain. She sits down, wings pressed tightly to her back.

"The pleasure is all mine," replies the Balseraph, ducking his head even lower to look her in the eyes. "What can I fetch for the lady?"

"I'm fine," she says, pulling closer to the Prince's legs. "I don't need anything."

"Do tell any of the servers if you change your mind," says Arguros. "We so seldom have the opportunity to entertain your kind." He pulls back up, tongue flicking between his scaled lips. "We're between rounds at the pit, but I'll have it readied. A drink in the meantime? For you and your companions?"

"That'll do." Valefor indicates Zhune and me, still a few steps behind him. "Leo would appreciate a beer and one of the quieter tables. One with a good view of the pit. The Binder--you remember Zhune, don't you?"

"How could I forget?" Arguros turns his head towards us, with a thin smile. "He made such an entrance when you brought him here. I had to have two tables replaced, and the grooves filled in on the door." He turns away, slipping gracefully along the polished floor. "This way, if you'd please."

The table he leads us to has been vacated hastily, the damned souls scrambling to wipe everything clean and retreat into the background before we sit down. One of the previous occupants, a Lilim wearing little and smaller than most of the demons here, lingers hopefully until Arguros waves her away. I find myself seated between Cherub and Djinn, with my Prince on the other side of the Judge. From this table, we have a view of the Stygian mountains out the window to our right, and a direct line of sight into a wide pit sunk into the floor in front of us.

The conclusion I come to is both obvious and unpleasant. Not that I have time to think about it, as my Prince drops the ribbon leash into my lap. "Take care of the kitten while I'm busy," he says, ruffling my hair. "And make sure she gives her daddy a call so that he knows not to worry." Then he's halfway across the room, discussing something with a Calabite who looks respectful of--but not intimidated by--her Prince.

Unlike me.

I'm distracted from any Prince-watching by a Cherub climbing into my lap. She can't fit more than her head and shoulders there, and that's enough to start cutting off circulation to my legs. Tawny feathers fluff up in my face as she rearranges her wings to a more comfortable position. "Hi, Leo!"

"Hi." I pull an arm free from under her, brushing through the soft mane. "I have this sneaking suspicion that you like me, right now."

"I _do_." She creeps further up on my lap, ignoring the ribbon in my hand. The leash isn't there for restraint. It's only for the image. For such a concrete Word, Theft seems bound up in metaphor and appearance. "I like you lots. I'm sorry I tried to kill you that one time. It wasn't personal, honest."

"That's very comforting, Hakupha." A beer is deposited on the table in front of me, and I have to grab it to keep her from knocking it over with a wing. "Weren't you going to give Dominic another call?"

"Oh, right!" She wrinkles her face in concentration, like a cat about to sneeze. "Okay. Now he knows."

I ask, against my better judgment, "What did you tell him?"

"That I was here with you and your Prince, and that I'm safe and he shouldn't worry. It's hard to get it all in just a few words." She licks me under the chin with a tongue as rough as any housecat's. "You taste funny. Sort of burny. Is that because you're a Calabite, or because you used to work for Fire?"

"I couldn't say." I take a drink over the top of her head, and find myself wishing my Prince would come back to take her off my hands. Lap. No, on second thought, let him deal with his other business here a little longer. I'm not looking forward to what comes next.

The Cherub inches further along my lap, starting to push up against Zhune on the other side. He looks down at her calmly. "Mine," he says.

"But I'm attuned too," she says indignantly, black claws flexing just past my legs. "I got there first."

I don't think Zhune's going to believe that was a mistake coming from a mushy brain. Which means I'll have to do some explaining later. Please, let it not be in front of our Prince. Admitting that I never mentioned the possibility that a Cherub of Judgment was attuned to me when I signed up would be awkward at best, and potentially fatal. "He's my partner," I say, before Zhune can respond. "So he takes precedence."

Hakupha sniffs. "But _I_ work for Judgment, so I'm better for you."

I think I could debate that at length, but what's the point with a brain-damaged Cherub? "He watches my back. _You_ keep trying to put me on trial."

"Oh," she says, frowning. "You'd probably get through that okay if you repented and asked for forgiveness. You'd do okay in Heaven once we got you there." She rubs her cheek against mine, her mane giving me a mouthful of Cherub fur until I can pull away. "I mean, we talked to Nik--"

"Hakupha, baby." I tap her on the nose, and smile as nicely as I can. "You keep talking about _me_. Why don't you tell me more about yourself?"

The Cherub blinks at me with amber eyes. "There's not a lot to tell," she says. "I'm a Cherub of Judgment. It's what I do."

Zhune mouths "boring" at me over her head, then leans back with his beer in one hand to look elegant and unconcerned. So he's not going to press me for answers right now, knowing some matters shouldn't be brought up when we're near our Prince. 

I scratch the Cherub behind the ears. "That's your job. What do you like?"

"I like my job?" She brightens. "And I like you. And I like your Prince. And the Shedite back at the first bar." She begins ticking names off on her claws. "And I like Ruhamah and the Most Holy and Joe, except I don't know him very well, but he seems like a good person. He doesn't talk much. And my Seraph, when we're in the regular triad, he's nice." She scoots forward on my lap. I've lost all feeling in one of my feet. "But I don't like Sean."

"Nobody likes Sean," I say, between sips of beer. It's good, if not quite to the quality of the beer I had in a Flowers Tether once. What does it say about Hell, that the best you can get in a place like this isn't as good as what the angels make on Earth? Maybe that we're more concerned with burning things down than how to make good beverages. Or maybe it's the Words like Lust and Gluttony that bother with these things. Though I'd presume Theft could _steal_ the best beer in Hell, if we tried.

"I think he wants to kill you," Hakupha says. "He said he did stuff with you before."

"Unfortunately, a lot of people I've worked with in the past want to kill me."

"That's sad." The Cherub shoves at Zhune with her front paws, wiggling further onto my lap. "If you come home with me, I'll keep you safe."

Zhune considers her over his bottle of beer, eyes narrow. "The offer I made earlier still stands," he says. "I'll arm-wrestle you for the Calabite. Best two of three gets to keep the attunement."

"Zhune--"

He waves away my objection, leaning down until he's nose to nose with the Cherub. From the way she shivers in my lap, I suspect she's looking right through the vessel form to his true form. "If you can't even beat me in that," he says, "you're not tough enough to keep him safe."

"I'm _very_ good at being a Cherub," she says, and sits up, taking her weight off my legs. " _You're_ only a Djinn. Best two of three?"

Zhune sets his elbow on the table in front of me. "Any time you're ready."

She puts her paw up against his. "Ready."

The Djinn slams her paw down onto the table hard enough to make the wood shiver, then takes a long swig of his beer before letting go. "Ready for the second round?"

"Ready," Hakupha says, with less confidence than the first time. She sets her paw up, and it's slammed down on the table again. "You're cheating!"

"No," Zhune says, and smiles down at her, dangerous and cruel at the edges. It's not a look I want turned on me. "You're an angel. You didn't grow up in Hell, where every other demon can mess with your head or make your guts bleed if you don't learn how to fight back. Are you going to remove your attunement?"

She pulls back onto my lap, pressing up against me as if I could make her feel better. "I'm not supposed to remove attunements without asking," she says. "The Most Holy told me to keep this one."

"So you made a deal knowing you couldn't keep your end of it if you lost? Is that from pride, or bad faith?" Zhune shakes his head, and smirks. "How typical. Can't keep your promises as well as a Lilim, and you call yourself a servant of justice. No wonder half of Heaven doesn't trust your Archangel."

"You're being mean," Hakupha says, voice shaky. "You're wrong. I can't think of the right words, but you're wrong. Leo, make him not be mean."

"Ask the impossible, why don't you." I sit there with a Cherub on my lap and watch my Prince across the room. "Have a drink."

"Alcohol can impair one's judgment," she tells me primly. "...and I had drinks back at the first place. And the second place."

"You're on vacation. You can let loose." I push her the beer she hasn't touched yet, and wait for her to start in. That should keep her quiet for a few minutes.

Zhune reclaims his place next to me--and a little closer than before--once the Cherub is distracted. "You have such a way with angels," he says lightly.

"I don't want to hear about it, Zhune." He won't take his eyes off me. I sigh, and tell him, "Later."

"Acceptable."

Zhune's through his second beer and starting on his third by the time I've finished my first, while Hakupha is still spending more time being suspicious of her bottle than drinking from it. He doesn't usually drink faster than I do; he gets someone else drunk while he remains alert and in control. Knowing that he's on edge too doesn't make me feel better. One of us should have some equanimity in this situation, and it's damn well not going to be me.

Our Prince returns to the table the long way around, slowing to speak with various demons as he goes. It gives Zhune and I enough time to pull ourselves together before he arrives. Not that Zhune is giving off any sign of being disturbed, beyond the drinking. Arguros follows behind, a river of silver flashing between the tables and demons.

"Miss me, kitten?" Valefor takes the leash back from me, tickles the Cherub under the chin when she switches her attention from me to him. "Aren't you a fickle Guardian. Ready for the show?"

"Sure!" She scrambles up onto his lap once allowed, leaving me with only the back half of a Cherub between me and my Prince. "What is it?"

"Only a sport to bet on," Valefor says. "The rules are straightforward, but there's skill and luck both, to make the betting interesting. Arguros, our contestants?"

The Balseraph bows, and with two wings sends a demon on each side of him stepping forward. A Djinn on his left, Calabite on his right, both of them too poorly-dressed and small to be part of the clientele. Each one wears a thick Geas band around his neck. "My apologies for the delay," Arguros says. "We had to check storage to find suitable candidates to fill your request."

Valefor waves away the apology, then points Hakupha in the direction of the two. "Which one do you like better, kitten?"

"Um." She fluffs up her wings. "I don't know? Um." She extends a claw towards the one on the right. "Him, I guess."

The Prince runs his fingers through her mane. "Developing a taste for Calabim, are you?"

"I like you," she says. "And I like Leo. And I don't like Djinn."

"A girl after my own heart." He sets her down on the floor. "Go shake hands with your favorite. How about you offer him some protection? He might need it."

Hakupha trots up to the geased Calabite, and offers him a paw. "I like you too," she says. "You're going to win, aren't you?"

He tries to smile back at her, though it's a sick look on his face. "I'll try."

Valefor collects his Cherub, and the two competing demons are whisked away by a large Shedite. Throughout the room, damned souls move about with notebooks to speak to people at each table. Arguros coils up near us, a respectful distance away. "Will you be placing a bet, Prince Valefor?"

"It makes the outcome more interesting. Put me down for the kitten's favorite." Arguros ducks his head, and flows away. The Prince's hand rests on the bow around Hakupha's neck. "Look in front of you for the game. They're about to start."

It's obvious, perfectly obvious, but she doesn't figure out what's going on until, down in the pit, the Djinn launches himself at the Calabite, teeth flashing.

"Hush, kitten," Valefor says, over her wailing. Her claws dig into the table as she tries to pull away from the one hand on her collar, her wings spread as if she could fly there. "It's against the rules to interfere. Doesn't Judgment want you to follow the rules?"

"It's _hurting_ him!" Hakupha begins to cry, still trying to pull away, and it would never occur to her to bite at the hand on her collar. This is how love works: it makes you stupid and helpless against people who can break you. "I have to help him!"

It would be easier to watch the fight than to watch the Cherub, even with the need to duck around a wing to see down there. I can't take my eyes off her. A Force shreds off the Calabite in the pit, and she keens, still trying to dig her way forward. It's _stupid_. You can't fight a Prince, not once he has you. "Don't worry," says the Prince with her leash. "It was only a corporeal one. It won't hurt his chances."

The noise in the pit isn't enough to cover her wailing, though the buzz from the rest of the room, those paying attention to the fight and those watching the Cherub, means she won't be heard from much further away than our table. Hakupha digs claws into the tabletop, sobbing. "Why won't you _stop_ them?"

"Because I don't want to," Valefor says patiently. One hand on her collar, and with his free hand he picks up the drink waiting for him. "Relax, kitten. They'll finish soon." Another Force drifts up from the pit, a spark drifting in the air until it fades away. I don't know which fighter that one came from, and Hakupha's attempts to drag herself towards her newest attuned haven't wavered in intensity since the fight began. 

"Arguros will need to replace another table," Zhune murmurs beside me. He's watching the fight. "Mm. The Djinn seems to be the stronger of the two, but the Calabite is faster. I think the Calabite will to win."

"Lucky him." I stare down at my beer. I can barely hear the sound from the pit through the wailing to my right. One of her back paws slams past me into the wall, cutting through my pants and into my leg. So now I'm bleeding here, too. It seems fair enough.

"It'll be close, though," Zhune says, in a voice so clinically detached it tells me what he's trying to hide. "It depends on which Forces get shredded first, and in what order. Once you start shedding Celestial Forces, the matter is settled. That's what adds an element of chance to the game that you don't have in corporeal fights. Neither of them can work out how to pull specific Forces off each other."

Hakupha's down to gasping sobs, hoarse from her crying and for pulling so hard against the ribbon around her neck. "Stop it. Please stop it."

Valefor sets down his drink to pet her. "Why, kitten?"

I wouldn't be able to come up with a clever answer, and the Cherub's not bright even without the Habbalite resonance killing her ability to think straight. She doesn't try to respond, only pulls forward towards her attuned as he's ripped apart in the pit.

It's been a long time since I last watched someone get reduced to component Forces. A person doesn't forget what it's like, having seen it once. The last Celestial Force is stripped, and the rest find they no longer have a reason to hold onto each other. Forces wisp away, visible for a moment to people like me before they lose their last grip on cohesion and return to wherever it is that Princes grab Forces from.

"There you go, kitten," says Valefor. "That wasn't so bad, was it? I knew you'd pick a winner." He lets go of her collar. A streak of black and gold resolves itself into the Cherub in the pit, curling up around the Calabite there. She sings Healing, then begins to lick at his wounds, wings spread above both of them like a shield. What she's saying I can't make out, a stream of whispered comfort drowned out by the noise of the room.

My Prince turns to me, and smiles. "Zhune's had his turn, and now it's yours, Leo. What do you think we should do with her next?"

I feel Habbie-rezzed myself, fraying at the edges of my grip on things. I don't think that's the alcohol in my system. "Give her back," I say.

Zhune goes still beside me. Arguros, discussing the resolution of bets with one of his employees and his back turned to us, twitches his wings, pulls them tight around him. And my Prince pauses, only a breath that's enough to make my own breath stop, before saying, "Why would I want to do that?"

"Because breaking her is so easy, it's boring." It feels like the moment when I smashed my Heart in Gehenna, not knowing if I'd escape or die. "I mean, she's a _Cherub_. Talk her into attuning to something, destroy it, repeat until she Falls or turns into a puddle of Discord. It's repetitive and has no challenge to it. When she _does_ Fall, all you have is a neurotic Djinn with no relevant skills who's neither useful nor entertaining."

Valefor hasn't interrupted me yet, watching me with an expression I can't interpret. I'm being given enough rope to hang myself. So be it. I suspect my grin looks off-kilter. "Besides, it's what they expect. Why should Heaven decide it's been proven right yet again? On the other hand, if she shows up on the altar of a Tether of the Sword, with a nice bow on top and a friendly card indicating the gift is for her Archangel... I think that's enough to make the Archangel of Judgment blink, if anyone can tell under the cloak."

My Prince considers me, fingers drumming on the table. His fingertips leave shallow grooves where they hit. "Did you talk to your last two Princes like this?"

"No," I say. "I spent any time in front of them with my mouth shut hoping they wouldn't kill me."

"Do you think I won't kill you?"

"I think," I say, because it's all I can come up with, "that lying to you when you ask me a question is less likely to improve my chances of survival than telling the truth."

Another breath. Then he's laughing, so hard demons who have been ignoring the whole conversation turn to look. "You're too sharp for your own good," he says, finally, tucking away all the laughter into a sharp smile. "It'll get you killed some day. But not today. Kitten!" The Cherub is back in his lap, wide-eyed. "Leo thinks we should send you home. Do you want to go, or stay here and have more fun with us?"

"I want to go home," she says, sniffling. She's trying to curl up against him for comfort. Now there's a losing proposition. "Everyone here is _mean_."

"That's Hell for you." He ruffles her mane. "I'm sure your trip to Stygia will be memorable. But we ought to make sure there's a way for people here to remember you too." He plucks a feather from her wings, and twirls it between his fingers. "Or find you, if they want to say hello again later. Isn't that fun?"

"It's not fun," she whimpers. "I want to go _home_."

"Soon enough." Valefor holds the feather out behind him. "Arguros! It's not worth as much as your table, but it's rare in these parts." He smiles out at every other demon who's watching us. "Who else wants a souvenir?"

Five minutes later, her wings are patchy, and Hakupha shivers against the Prince, no longer protesting. "I want to go home."

"Almost time." He tilts her head up to look him in the eyes. "Let's see. I'm going to pull all your attunements, except for the one on the Destroyer in the pit. You can keep on protecting him as long as you'd like. Matter of fact, if you show up in Hell again, send me a message and I'll make sure you're delivered to him. He'd appreciate the company." She turns to look for her attuned, who's been removed from the pit. Damned souls scrub the floor and walls back to pristine condition. Valefor turns her back towards him. "That's everything for you," he says. "Now I'm going to drop you off at your front door. I'd give your daddy a call to come pick you up, but I think the card will say it all."

She vanishes from his lap. Someone in that church is about to get a nasty surprise. Then it's Zhune and I as the focus of our Prince's attention again. "Which leaves you two," he says. "You've given me a few hours of amusement, which is worth something, and some fresh ire from Judgment, which doesn't change a thing on that end. So I'll give you an opportunity."

Since the last opportunity he gave me was to swear loyalty to his Word or die, this does not fill me with joy.

"I gave you two weeks to finish that little job," our Prince says, "and you're already done. Told you to keep quiet, and you were anything but. So now you have until the end of that two weeks to do another job for me." He points to Zhune. "You know the locations of several Judgment Tethers. Pick one, I don't care which, though I wouldn't recommend the Supreme Court. At the end of the two weeks, I'm going to stop by to say hello and see what you have for me. What I give you depends on what you've found to give _me_. Understood?" We nod to him. "I knew you two would make a great team. Don't disappoint me."

The world changes around us. An alley I don't recognize, dark and smelly, but there are stars somewhere above, hidden by the shine of distant streetlights.

"Fuck," I say, and move towards the mouth of the alley to figure out where we are. Three steps in, I realize my leg and shoulder don't hurt anymore. So we got a little credit for the entertainment. "What's he going to find _interesting_ from a Judgment Tether? That we can locate, swipe, and keep from getting caught with in the space of two weeks?"

"I'm not sure," Zhune says. He buttons up his jacket, hiding his lack of shirt. His wounds have vanished as well. "Let's find a bar."

"A bar? We need to _plan_."

"No," Zhune says, an arm over my shoulder. "We need to get you drunk enough to calm down. And then we need to talk. Got it?"

I'm moving in the direction he's pushing me. "Sure," I say. "I can work with that."


	17. An Interlude, In Which Sean Is Still A Devious Bastard

Ruhamah snapped the phone shut without a pause in his pacing around the room. "She's back," he said.

"Back?" Sean sat up, reaching for his gun. "What kind of back?"

"Back as in dropped off at a Tether back, and I need to get home," said the Ofanite. Joe was already packing the laptop away. "Urgently enough to head straight to the nearest Tether, but I'm told to not make any disturbance to draw attention here, in case there's still someone in the area."

"Back is good," Sean said. He stood up, pulled his jacket on. "Do you want me to come with you? I can call my friend and tell him to meet me at the Tether instead of here. It won't take much longer."

"No, that won't be necessary." Ruhamah folded his arms across his chest, and rocked on his heels, face tight. "If you want to stay here and look for anything useful, feel free. I have to--" He shook his head.

"Is she going to be okay?" Sean didn't sit back down, despite the pain in his chest. "What happened?"

"I don't know. They didn't tell me anything else. I need to get back home." Ruhamah slung a bag over his shoulder, moved towards the door. "The room's paid through tomorrow morning. Keep it as long as you want."

"I'm sorry," Sean said. He took a slow step forward, conscious of how much his legs didn't want to move. "I hope she's okay."

The Ofanite took a deep breath. Turned around. "Thank you," he said. "And...thank you for not undermining us during this. You did your best to help us get the job done, when you didn't have to, and it was unjust of me to suspect you'd try otherwise."

"Hey," Sean said. "I have my own opinions about Judgment, but I don't let it get in the way of work. Especially when we have the same goals." He offered a hand. "Let me know what happened, if you can?"

Ruhamah stared at him for a moment. Then shook his hand, brisk and tight as an Ofanite usually was. "I'll see what I can do," he said. "Joe? Let's get moving."

Sean offered the same hand to the Malakite, and got the same response, if with a firmer grip. Once the Judges had left, he shut the door behind them, and sat back down on the floor.

"Well," he said to himself, and held up the hairs he'd taken off the sleeve of Joe's coat. Short, and a reddish brown even under the bad lighting. "Score one for War."


	18. In Which We Talk

I'm still walking in a straight line, or close enough to it that Zhune's support is unnecessary. Nonetheless, I'm willing to let him fiddle with the door card so that I don't have to. Fitting a thin plastic card into the reader, then pulling it out again and turning the knob while the light is green... Is beyond me, right now. The door swings open while I'm leaning against it, sending me staggering into the room. "Nice room."

"Money is there for the spending or the taking," Zhune says. He closes the door behind us, letting me fall into a chair without help. "Since I already took it, I thought I should go ahead and spend it. Besides, you said you were tired of motels."

"Tired of rented rooms," I explain. The buzz will start wearing off soon, but I can enjoy the moment of incoherence while it lasts. "This is the kind of place that expects you to tip. And they carry your bags. Except we didn't have any bags. The man at the desk believes you're taking advantage of some drunk college girl who's impressed by your looks and money, but he's too professional to say so."

Zhune sprawls out on the bed, chin resting on his hands. His vessel is too good-looking for a Djinn. It must be a Theft thing, all these pretty vessels that attract attention, even though I would have thought inconspicuous would be safer. Maybe it comes from hanging around with Lust too much. "Are you?"

"Am I what?" Usually I'd follow. In twenty minutes, I'll follow. Right now, I can't follow anything without a brightly-lit exit sign and guardrails.

"Impressed by my looks and money. Being taken advantage of. Drunk and college I already know the answers to."

"Not so impressed by money as I used to be. Not impressed by your looks. You're not my type." Sitting up makes me feel lousy, so I make it over to the bed to lie down beside Zhune. This way I don't have to look at him. "There was this one time I met Regan in a hotel room this expensive. She offered me ten thousand dollars to help her with security for a project of hers. At the time, it seemed like a lot of money. But at the time, I had a Role to make purchases for. There's not a lot of point in buying anything if you keep moving. Not more than you can carry with you."

"And are you being taken advantage of?" Apparently my digression isn't enough to distract him from his question. Djinn hold their focus once they've chosen it.

"Not terribly." He chuckles beside me, and I bury my face in my arms. "Maybe somewhat. It's the natural state for celestials, to have someone using us. I use you, you use me, we're a happy family."

"If you start singing," Zhune says, "I'm never going to let you live that down."

"No fear of that." I don't want to say anything more, and so I stay quiet until he has to speak up. It's petty of me. I'll be more polite when I'm more sober. 

"You did okay." He sits up, hands behind him. "You could have done better. When the boss asks you for suggestions, I recommend trying for an answer he'd like, not one he isn't expecting. Princes...seldom react well to being surprised."

"I don't know what there is to do in Stygia besides drink and backstab. It was the only suggestion I could come up with." I roll over on my back, one arm lying over my face. The lights are too bright in here. "I didn't _think_ it was that unexpected an answer. Perfectly reasonable strategy if you're more interested in mocking Heaven than getting another Djinn. He doesn't even have many Djinn. You're the only one of Theft I've known by name."

"He would have gotten bored with her eventually," Zhune says. He slides my arm off my face so that I have to look at him again. "But it would have been on his schedule. That was close. Don't do it again."

"You almost sound concerned."

Zhune puts both hands on my shoulders, looming over me. "Leo. If anything happens to you? I'm the one he looks to next. It's in _my_ best interest that you stay alive, don't screw up, and above all else, don't. Make him. Unhappy."

"I'm not trying to."

"Try harder not to." Zhune sits back, giving me more breathing room. "I'm willing to cover for you as far as I can, but I can't support you if you're not telling me everything. Which is why--"

"We need to talk, I know. I said later, and now it's later." I take his hand for help in pulling myself back up. "This is--look. I'm still not sober, and I'm coming down from the part where I nearly got myself killed. Can you give me half an hour of space? Half an hour, and then we'll talk."

Do Djinn usually attune for this long? I wonder what it's like for them to hold without letting go. His hand is still on mine. "Okay," he says. "Half an hour."

By the time he reaches the door, he's lost the serious look, and he's back to dangerous confidence. The monkeys at the hotel bar will be swooning for him.

I wait for the door to shut. My head's starting to throb. If I were human, I'd be worried that I had a drinking problem. As it is, I'm only tired of the headaches.

The cell phone in my pocket blinks on when I open it up. These things last for weeks if I use them occasionally, days if I carry them on me. Since I picked it up an hour ago, there's a good chance it won't die during the call. It's a number I haven't used in, what, two years now? Maybe more. Fortunate for me that it's an easy set to remember, burned into my mind long ago when I was more concerned about the possibility of death. Not that death has become any less likely; I've only become more used to the possibility.

Two rings, and someone picks up on the other end. "Hi! This is the private line! Who do you want to talk to?"

It's a different vessel, but I can recognize her voice nonetheless. She has a distinct way of speaking. "Hello, Ling. Can I talk to Iris?"

"Maybe," she says. A perfectly Seraphic answer. "Do I know you?"

"For certain specialized definitions of the verb, yes. Tell him that Leo's calling?"

"You sound different," Ling says, and the phone clatters down on the table. Footsteps pound away on creaky hardwood floors, as she calls, "Iris! Call for you!"

I'm not sure what time it is in their time zone. I haven't looked at a clock since we appeared in the alley, and I'm not sure what city we're in. Zhune probably knows. Doesn't matter; angels don't need sleep any more than demons do.

"Leo? It has been a while." Iris sounds like he always does: old, thoughtful, sincerely concerned for the well-being of anyone he's speaking to.

"Iris. Hi." Now that he's on the line, I'm not sure what I want to say. "Been a while." What he just said, apparently.

"New vessel?" Every time I get him on the phone, I can hear him making tea. I'm not sure if he actually wants tea, or if it's a ritual for dealing with difficult people who insist on holding conversations. Right now he's filling the tea kettle.

"Yeah. New vessel."

"You're working for another Prince, then." I wish he didn't sound disappointed. Doesn't Heaven hate Renegades nearly as much as Hell does? I got the impression Judgment approves of free-roaming demons even less than the Prince-bound sort.

"Yeah. Word didn't get to you?"

"There are many things Flowers is known for," he says, "but being given relevant information by other Words is, unfortunately, not one of those things. No, I hadn't heard. When did this happen?"

"About a year ago. It wasn't something I went looking for."

"Perhaps you should have been looking for something else."

"Maybe. I don't know."

He sighs on the other end. "Why did you call, Leo?" From him, it's not an accusation, but an honest question.

"Because I need to talk to someone. And you're the only person I know who hasn't tried to kill me, or fuck with my head, or push me into doing things I didn't want to."

"The only one?"

"And I don't have Penny's number." The headache's getting worse, and all the artificial calm has disappeared. "If you have the number, I can call him instead."

"I wondered," Iris says, "if I should have tried to push you harder towards a decision. But it never seemed like a good idea. You've shown a remarkable tendency to bolt in any direction but the one a person would like you to go, when pressed."

"It's one of my defining traits. I don't do well with authority."

"And yet, you're serving a Prince again."

"Yeah."

"Did it ever occur to you that if you took matters into your own hands, you might have been able to choose who to serve, instead of having it forced on you?"

Now it's my turn to sigh. "And if I ever find someone I _want_ to work for, Iris, I'll keep that in mind. Maybe I'm just bad at deciding between multiple options when I don't like any of them."

"If you put off decisions for long enough, someone else will make them for you."

"I _know_." And I don't know why I called, except it seemed like the thing to do.

"What happened?"

"What?"

"What happened, Leo? The last time you called me, it was because Nikostratos was taking too much dissonance. You don't call a Flowers Tether on a whim, especially not while working for a Prince. So what's given you reason to call this time?"

"I screwed up. I really screwed up." What Iris knows I don't want to tell Zhune. What Zhune knows I don't want to tell Iris. My head hurts and I want to hide, except everyone keeps finding me. "Judgment decided to get personal on me after four years of leaving me alone, and--look, I didn't panic, that's not an excuse. I got a Cherub dragged into Hell, and then I got her kicked back out again."

The Mercurian's quiet for a long time, until the kettle starts whistling. "You got her out of Hell?"

"This. This is the _problem_." I'm not usually so inarticulate. It feels like Habbalah have been chewing on my mind until I can't think straight. "I nearly got myself killed, Iris. For a Cherub of Judgment. One who tried to kill me before. I should have left her there."

"You're developing empathy."

"I'm not supposed to empathize!" At some point I hit the floor, and this room isn't big enough, sending me stalking back and forth from one end to another. "I'm a demon, Iris. High-functioning sociopath. I'm not supposed to care for anyone else except so far as they do something for me, and believe me, a Cherub of Judgment doesn't qualify."

I can hear him pouring tea. It really is a coping mechanism for these phone calls. "You think this is a bad thing?"

"I know it is." So this is what I wanted to talk to him about. Nice to figure it out. Next time, I'm going to lock it away with everything else I'm in denial on, and save myself the trouble. "I'm broken, Iris. I'm not up to factory specs. I have voided my warranty and I'm getting to the point where people are _noticing_. Even Judgment claims they want to talk to me, or did up until I passed one of theirs off to a Prince. This is a weakness. I've managed to get away from everyone who was making me care too much to do what I should, Katherine and Nik and Regan and Ferro and Penny, I got away from them, and it's not helping. I'm breaking and I don't know how to fix it."

He sounds as if he's being very careful in his words. "I can't help you become a better demon, Leo."

"I don't expect you to. But who else can I talk to about this?" I'm tired of pacing, and my head is pounding to the rhythm of my steps. I sit down in a corner with my head against the wall, eyes closed. The lights in here are too bright. "This is the part where you tell me I should go turn myself over to Judgment, isn't it?"

"Actually, I was going to recommend coming to my Tether as soon as you could find an excuse to move through the area. It might be wise to not confront Judgment directly until after you've determined what information they have on your...recent activities." A short laugh from the Seneschal. "But it comes to about what you expected, yes. Are you going to take the offer?"

"No."

"Why not? What can be keeping you where you are?"

"It goes like this." My throat hurts now. I wonder when Zhune will be back. "He outsmarted me. Pure and simple."

"Who did, Leo?"

"My Prince. I shouldn't be surprised, but... I didn't think of it, you know? I'm used to thinking of Princes as more powerful, dangerous, deadly, experienced, all that sort of thing. Somehow, it never really got through to me before that they're smarter, too." I open my eyes so I can watch the door. The light on the lock will turn on if someone's put the card in. "I have this partner, see. He's a demon. Terrible person. But he's good to me. If I run to Heaven, he'll be held responsible for not seeing it coming. For not stopping me. And I _care_. See, that's the part where I'm outsmarted. If I didn't care, I could run, but I wouldn't want to. So long as I'm giving a damn about other people, I want out, and I can't leave."

"We can work something out," Iris says. "Leo--"

"No. We can't. But thanks for wanting to help. Not many people do." I shut the phone before he can talk me into anything stupid. I'm in an odd enough mood tonight that I might listen. Near-death encounters unsettle me that way.

To avoid more questions than I already have to deal with, I resonate the cell phone into dust fine enough to disappear under the bed. And then wait for Zhune to come back.

He shows up on what's probably the exact half hour mark, strolling in with his hands in his pockets. At some point, a new shirt has been acquired, and now he looks gracefully rumpled. I just look like a mess. He walks over to the corner where I'm still sitting, and offers me a hand. "You don't look so good."

"Thanks." I take the assistance so long as it's offered. He's not a Lilim, to hold me in debt for every little favor.

"Oh, you're still cute, but you look like you've been through hell." He grins at my expression. "Metaphorically as well as literally."

"It's been a long day."

"It's been a fucking long day," he says, and shoves me down onto the bed, then sits beside me. "But we now have some breathing space to work things out, so you can stop stressing already."

"You call nine days breathing space?"

He sits down beside me, and begins taking off his shoes. "In Theft? Sure. Henry and I once got a message that had been delayed in transit, and had to arrange for an angry, conscious grizzly bear to be delivered to an enclosed hunting ground in the space of three hours. Now that's cutting it close."

"Did you pull it off?"

"Almost. We had to settle for a black bear. Since the right person got mauled, it was considered a success." Zhune tosses his shoes across the room. "How long was that Cherub attuned to you?"

"Since I first met her. Back when I was working for Fire." I bend down to yank my own shoes off, stupid grubby sneakers that I need to replace with decent shoes when I get the chance. A good pair of boots will only look scuffed for the first few weeks I have them on. "After looking over my shoulder for a few months, I assumed she'd removed the attunement. I was wrong."

Zhune nods. "Who's Nik?"

"Outcast Kyriotate of the Sword. Last I knew her, anyway. Must've worked her way back into Heaven's good graces. While I was Renegade, we stuck together for protection. She was a good scout, but as dumb as a box of rocks." I'm doing her an injustice in this description. Under the circumstances, I don't think she'd hold that against me. "She picked up some dissonance, ran off to find a Tether that would let her work it off, and that was the last I saw of her. At some point after that, I guess she spoke to Judgment about me."

"Anything else?"

I pull my feet under me on the bed. It's that or try to run away. "When I mentioned I worked with Sean before? That was while I was Renegade. He's been a Mercurian for as long as I've known him, and always something of a bastard. Servitor of War, not the Sword."

"Okay."

"And when I got rid of the kid? I left her at a Tether of Judgment with a helpful note of introduction. Written in Helltongue, so it took them long enough to dig up a translator for me to get out of the blast radius before they read it."

"Considering how many times she tried to set me on fire," Zhune says, "I think we came out ahead on that trade."

"It was only the once."

"That you heard about."

"In retrospect," I say, "Judgment might have been a bad idea for where to leave her."

"Possibly so."

Here we are, talking like two responsible adults instead of kleptomaniac demons. It's bizarre. "Any questions?"

Zhune thinks it over. "What were you doing with a Mercurian of War?"

"It's under contract. The kind where I keel over if I talk about the details."

"You didn't mention dealing with Trade."

"It didn't seem relevant. But, yes, Trade got involved in there too. I told you about the Flowers Tether, right?"

"After you went Renegade, right."

We sit there on the bed for a quiet moment. 

"So," I say, "you don't seem upset about this."

"You had your reasons for not telling me," Zhune says. "They probably seemed like good reasons. And now I know. So why should I be upset?"

"Because I lied to you? On multiple occasions?"

The Djinn laughs, and slaps me on the back. "You've worked with Balseraphs before. You think I'm going to take a few lies personally?"

I stare back at him. "Is there anything I can do that will piss you off?"

"Die," he says. "Or run away. I know you wouldn't deliberately botch a job, so that's not an issue."

"Oh," I say. "Great. I think."

Zhune taps me under the chin. "Relax. Now, do you have any questions for me? Seeing as we're having this heart-to-heart and all."

"Two," I say. "Why did you suggest the Silver Scale?"

I'm learning what it looks like, that lack of tension around the corners of his eyes, when he's trying to act like it doesn't bother him. "We would have gone there eventually," he says. "Once he decided to take us along... I'd rather know when it was coming. Besides, I knew he'd like the suggestion, coming from me."

Because you don't get to be a Demon Prince without learning to enjoy cruelty, even when it's small and quiet. "Last question," I say. "How long ago did he steal you from the Game?"

Zhune barks out a laugh. "I didn't realize it was obvious."

"When you're busy putting on your best face for our Lord, you aren't paying attention to fooling me." I grin up at him, sharp and insincere, as if I don't care either way. It's the least I can do. "Up until then, I thought you'd come over from Lust."

"Twelve hundred years," he says. "Give or take a few. He was a new Prince at the time, but the Game and Theft loathed each other from the start. My partner was out a vessel, and so were two of the three we'd been attempting to...capture or kill, either was within parameters. The one who was left called her Prince."

I should let sleeping dogs lie. But he pauses there as if he's waiting for another question, even while I promised only two. "Asmodeus didn't demand your return?"

"He--my new Prince made me a Heart, and the old one broke. Presumably, I was written off as soul-killed." Zhune laughs again. From anyone else, it would be bitter, but he sounds amused. "So far as I know, the Game has never found out otherwise. I'd like to keep it that way."

"They won't hear it from me."

"Really."

"I may be a liar, thief, and duplicitous bastard who can twist words and dig loopholes, but I keep my promises. I consider it my most endearing quality."

"No," Zhune says, "that's not your most endearing quality."

"So what is?"

"You're out of questions," he says. "You want an answer to that one, you'll have to ask later."

At some point, my headache faded to a distant throb I can ignore. "We should figure out what we're going to do on this Tether job."

"I have a clever plan," Zhune says. "Tell me how this sounds."

"I'm listening."

"We order overpriced room service, with a bottle of even more overpriced wine. Once you're sufficiently past sober to not object, I'll keep you distracted for an hour or so. That can take your mind off all this talk of what's long past. After that? We figure out what we're going to do next."

"Sure," I say. "I can work with this plan."


	19. An Interlude, In Which Incomplete Information Is Reviewed

Ruhamah blinked, insofar as several fiery wheels rotating at high speed in one place could blink. "You have to be kidding me."

"I assure you, honorable Wheel, that I am not attempting to make light of the situation," said the reliever clutching the file folder. Its black wings drifted up and down steadily, sending breezes that ruffled the flames of the Ofanite's rings. "We checked the records, and we do not have a listing for an angel by that combination of Choir, Word, name, and Distinction. To check for an error in the records, we then sent a request for further information to the Tether--"

"Short and sweet," Ruhamah said. "Please. It's been a long day."

The reliever blinked several times, frowning. "It's apparently a Role name, rather than a true name. We've sent on a request for clarification to War, but haven't yet received a response."

"How many Mercurians of War with Distinctions can there be? No, wait," the Ofanite added quickly, "that was a rhetorical question, don't try to answer it. Just... send me a message if you hear back from War, please."

"As you wish," said the reliever, ducking its head. It winged away briskly towards wherever its armful of files should go. Ruhamah spun off in another direction, muttering to itself.

The door to the room was still closed. The Mercurian standing outside spread her hands, shook her head at the Ofanite. "They're still on the debriefing."

"I can't see her?"

"The Power says that encountering other members of her triad at this time would be sufficiently stressful as to interfere with the debriefing. I'm sorry."

Ruhamah spun in one place, sparks flickering off its rims. "You will let me know when I can see her?"

"I assure you," said the Mercurian, in an ever-patient voice, "we tell you as soon as your presence would be appreciated. She needs some space right now, and we already have the Seraph and the Elohite in there with her."

"She needs her friends," said Ruhamah, but they both knew it as opinion, not fact. "I won't be far." And as it spun off again, the Ofanite added under its breath, "The Elohite can go stick its objectivity up its ungendered _ass_ if it thinks I'm going to--oh. Hi, Joe."

Joe nodded to the Ofanite as stolidly as ever. Ruhamah saw how all the feathers in his wings were ruffled askew. A raised eyebrow conveyed the question.

"No," Ruhamah said. "She's still in there. I'm getting the feeling she doesn't want to see us right now. They're not telling me anything yet. Oh, it makes me want to go _smite_ someone. A very specific someone."

The Malakite blinked.

"Well, no," Ruhamah said, rings shivering. "Yes, I want to smite, but what I really want to do is tie that Destroyer to a chair and beat her with a stick until the Ofanite pops out. Assuming we ever run into her again. The Earth is a very large place, and a demon can disappear in the midst of it without even trying. I think she'll be trying."

Down the hall, a voice rose in protest. "Look, if you don't _want_ me to show up, you could stop sending people over to poke Warriors with sticks until--yes, that is a metaphorical stick I'm referring to, you can be sure you'd hear about it if Judges were using literal sticks to poke any of us--don't you have anything better to do than harass me? Or is that standard Judgment procedure?"

Joe strode briskly down the corridor, Ruhamah at his heels. There was an irate Mercurian in leather pants and not much else standing in the midst of several flustered relievers, a pistol in a holster slung at his hip. "Oh, hey, Silent Joe," said the Mercurian. "About time you got here. And you'd be Ruhamah?"

"While you would not be Sean," said the Ofanite.

The Mercurian smiled toothily. His celestial form had none of the harmless appearance of his vessel. "I consider going by a true name on the corporeal a needless breach of security. So what did you want to talk to me about?"

"Private room," Ruhamah said, and pointed to a reliever. The reliever fluttered, confused for a moment, then indicated a nearby door. "Thanks," the Ofanite said, and then escorted Malakite and Mercurian both inside.

"You did ask for news of what happened," Ruhamah said, as soon as the door was shut. "Hakupha has been retrieved, and is...mostly unharmed, I'm told, as physical matters go."

"But she's not doing as well on the mental stability front?" Sean dropped down into a chair suited for his shape, and shook his head. "Poor kid. If she's not missing any Forces... Discord?"

"None was mentioned."

"Then she got off damn lucky." The Mercurian swung his legs over the arm of the chair. "But you didn't ask me to show up just so that you could tell me that in person."

"Not entirely." Ruhamah settled its rings about a Seraph-appropriate perch, and tried to think soothing thoughts to itself about justice and healing. These thoughts were less comforting now than they had been at other times. "Let me be blunt. This was supposed to be a simple retrieval mission. Now that Hakupha's attunement to the Destroyer has been broken, it turns into a footnote on a file and that's the end of matters, unless we happen to run into the demon again. This doesn't have the priority to justify spending more resources on it than we already have. However, if you found anything in your investigation that might give the case higher priority, or a means of tracking the demon..."

Sean spread his hands. "We checked out a few places after you left, but didn't find anything new there of interest. Picking up evidence after a Calabite's been through only works if the Calabite in question was stupid enough, or in enough of a hurry, to not resonate anything incriminating to shreds. Tracked down the place where the invocation occurred, but about all you could say for the place was that they rearranged the furniture poorly."

"Ah," said Ruhamah. "Well. Thank you for your time. We won't keep you any longer."

The Mercurian stood up. "Any chance I can get a copy of the debriefing once the Guardian's done in there?"

"I don't yet know what portions of that information might be considered classified. If you'd like to fill out a request--"

"Paperwork," Sean said. "I should have guessed. Well, wish the kid good health for me whenever they let her escape from the interrogation. In the meantime, I have other things to attend to."

"Go in justice," Ruhamah murmured. Its wheels spun against each other. Once the Mercurian was gone, it turned its attention to the Malakite. "What do you think the chances are that he's hiding something from us?"

Joe put out a hand, tilted it one way and then the other.

"My thoughts exactly. We're unlikely to discover more." The Ofanite slipped off its perch. "I'm going to wait by the door. I ought to be there when she needs me. It wouldn't be right if she wanted to see me and I was halfway across the city. I can't believe I let them get the drop on me that way."

"It happens," said Joe.


	20. In Which Some Issues Remain Unresolved

Zhune's dressed down for the occasion, jeans and a plain black T-shirt, to blend in with the crowd. He can pull off the look of an older student on campus, especially with the backpack slung over one shoulder. As for me, well, if there's any place I can get away with looking eighteen and dressing like I forgot to do the laundry, it would be here. We've passed three people wearing more battered clothing than I am, two of them making it look like a style choice.

"Homesick?" Zhune asks.

I didn't realize I was looking wistful. "I liked college. Concrete goals divided up into semester-long portions, a constant flow of new information, and minimal supervision. If I could find a way to juggle a class schedule with the job, I'd try. The hard part would be faking the transcripts for the application."

"Or have yourself entered into the system as a pre-existing student, and skip all the boring freshman courses." He holds my hand, as if we're one of the other couples absorbed in each other as they move through the quad.

"I don't mind freshman classes. I could do without having to go through composition again, but introductory courses are a good way of picking up the basics of a field." The college I attended wasn't so well-kept as this one. The buildings here are hidden behind trees, hedges, and climbing ivy. If it weren't for the hundreds of students streaming across the paths and grass, the place would be idyllic. "When did you run across this place?"

"Twenty years or so ago. Back when it was new," Zhune says. He means the Tether, not the college. The plaques affixed to every bench, drinking fountain, and occasional tree are full of dates declaring the bequests from alumni back to the late nineteenth century. "We came to take a look on the assumption it was full of Shepherds, not Judges. In retrospect, that the library was attached to a college of law should have been a hint. Apparently Nicky won that argument."

"Find anything interesting?"

"At the time? No. They were still setting up the defenses. There wasn't a thing inside worth taking, and no obvious route for trying to do a Tether switch."

"And we don't find hanging around law students interesting at length."

"That too." He takes us along a side path, beneath a stone archway with another plaque. Somewhere in the city, there's an engraving shop funded entirely by doing inscriptions for this university. "Kyrio Seneschal at the time, but it's possible it's changed since. Likely point for staff is the student worker who checks IDs at the door, but they won't have the personnel to keep that covered and resonating during all hours." He lowers his voice as the roar of between-classes crowds drop behind us. The stonework here has been designed for a less friendly appearance, with soaring lines and Grecian pillars to remind all the law students that they're engaged in serious business. That said, students of this college are dressed no differently than the ones elsewhere. Future lawyers of this country are as happy to wear ripped jeans or preppy button-down shirts as the others.

"Recon might be difficult, with a multi-part Seneschal. Can't distract them in one place and be sure they aren't watching another." I wish I'd had a chance to pick up the blueprints for the library, but there isn't the time. Official college floorplans showing the areas open to students aren't as detailed as I'd like. Everything interesting will be in restricted areas. "We're going to have to do a daytime job, aren't we?"

"It's either that or dodge security without a few hundred monkeys providing cover." Zhune squeezes my hand. "So we'll be quiet. We can do quiet. With a week left, we can afford to take the time and look for something suitable."

We push through the doors to the library, into the entrance where a bored student paying more attention to her homework than her job waits to check IDs. "Buying presents is so tricky when people won't make up a wish list." I flash my student ID (authentic, though not mine) and continue on, while Zhune fishes through his pockets for his to do the same. For all the scrutiny we got, we could have been flashing KGB badges at her.

"And gift certificates are so impersonal," Zhune says. The first room holds checkout desks, reference librarians dealing with questions, and more dark wood than any one room should contain. We make our way to a display case of historical photographs. "I'm going to take a look at the rare and old books. You?"

"I'll see what marvels this library holds," I say, pulling my hand away from his. "And check out the layout so I don't get lost in here." He thinks I'm kidding, but I'm not. My college's library had been added to so many times the number of floors didn't match on various parts of the building, and I once spent ten minutes trying to find my way back down to a floor attached to an area I could recognize. "Meet back here in two hours?"

"And try to keep it quiet."

"It's a library, John. I know how to keep quiet in a library."

He kisses me on the lips, not long enough to annoy anyone in sight except for me. "Two hours," he says, looking for all the world like a love-sick college boy who can't bear to leave his girlfriend alone for that long. And because it would draw attention if anyone noticed, I can't even glare back at him.

College libraries have a particular smell to them, whether they're generic or specialized, no matter what part of the country they're in. The echoing stairwell leading up to the top floor could have been pulled directly out of my memory, with a change in paint color and worn railings of a different type. Fashion changes in a decade, but not enough that any of the students I pass on the stairs couldn't have been my classmates. The nostalgia is distracting. I don't have the time to waste on wishing for the past. Besides, my college days had their problems. I wasn't often in danger of death, but reporting in to a Habbalite every week made up for that.

Floor-length windows line the walls every few yards along the top floor. According to the floor plan and guide posted by the elevator, the basement has the computer labs, while the top floor is one of many sets of stacks. I step into the midst of the pale yellow bookcases. Time to find something interesting. I don't have high hopes for "interesting" showing up in the public top floor stacks, but I'm going to kick myself for it later if I don't check.

Unlike the last library, this one has been laid out by someone who does not have a lasting grudge against students. The floorplan defined in helpful signs matches what's been laid out, and you don't have to do odd rotations to figure out where the next books in sequence continue from the end of a shelf. If it had a fiction section instead of being a law library, and rid itself of all the angels, I could like this place.

I've gone up and down four aisles before I realize the blond jock at one of the study carrels is not so much acting suspiciously in my direction as checking me out. This female vessel continues to confuse me. At least I haven't walked into the wrong bathroom yet.

Nothing that can be checked out from a library will interest my Prince. I give up on the stacks and survey the rest of the room. The relief of blindfolded justice on one wall might be worth points for ironic commentary alone, but I'm sure I couldn't pull that off the wall and cart it away without a Kyriotate Seneschal noticing. 

"Boo," says Sean, right behind me.

I slam an elbow back and try to bolt. Try being the operative word, as he has an arm around my neck and a hand over my mouth before I can make it one step away. The soles of my shoes squeak across the floor when he drags me back into an aisle. "Let's not bother anyone," he murmurs, right in my ear. "If you want to start screaming, remember who's going to show up to find out what's going on. Ditto on running fast enough to attract attention. So I'm going to let go, and you're going to be polite and _quiet_. Got it?"

He pulls his hand off my mouth. "Asshole," I say, though not loudly. "Is jumping me your new hobby? It's getting old."

"You're lucky they don't have an Ofanite in here. They'd be able to hear you coming from half a block away with that Discord, wouldn't they?"

"Don't you have anything better to do than annoy me?" A professorial man with his nose in a book walks past the mouth of the aisle, pauses to read the sign, then comes walking past us to check a shelf. Sean glances at the man, dismisses him from consideration. I lower my voice, not so far that the human can't hear us. "I already told you, Sean. I'm seeing someone else now. Give it up."

The Mercurian's lips twitch. "Leah, I don't think you're being fair. You can't ditch me without so much as a note, run off with another guy, and expect me to take it lying down."

"You think I should be even more fickle, and change my mind again?" I yank a book at random from the shelf. _Comparative Constitutionalism: Cases and Materials_. Even the books are dull around Judgment. They can suck the fun out of anything. "You think that because I haven't come to the same conclusion you have, it means I haven't thought about it. Try to consider the possibility that I have different information than you do."

"Didn't we have something great together? Something that could have been more?" His smile's a touch fixed, and it's right this instant that I realize he wants to attract attention in this Tether exactly as much as I do. Sure, sneaking around a Judgment Tether will get me killed if caught, while it would only put him in an awkward political situation, but he has time to care about that kind of thing. Judgment will have all sorts of questions for a Servitor of War who decided to chat up a Servitor of Theft in _their_ Tether without giving them notice.

"You're dreaming, Sean." The professor stands up with a stack of books, walks briskly out of the aisle with the look of a man who doesn't wish to let on that he was overhearing a private conversation. "Don't you have anything better to do with your time? Doing whatever it is Mercurians of War do when they're not harassing me?"

"You haven't even heard what I want." He takes the book out of my hand, replaces it on the shelf. "Give me a minute to explain."

"No. I'm not standing around to listen to whatever argument you have this time." I leave the aisle, the Mercurian trailing behind me. "Go away."

"Not until you listen to me."

"Why should I? You don't have anything to say that I haven't heard before." I move towards the carrels, past the blond kid who's now trying to listen in on the conversation without being obvious about it. He's pretty obvious about it. "Taking a semester off and a changing majors doesn't mean I want to transfer to another college." I drop down into one of the chairs, two spaces away from the human. I hope he's human. If the kid who's been checking me out is actually a Seraph of Judgment who's been gathering evidence against the both of us, I'm going to--I don't know. Collapse in hysterical laughter, possibly.

"If your current college isn't working out for you, why not?" Sean slouches against the desk, visibly annoyed at needing to speak this way. Good. Any day when I can irritate an angel gets points in its favor. "You're not even excited about your current major."

"Better than the complete lack of interesting majors at your college. I'm not the ROTC type."

"It's not like there's only one program," Sean says. He's verging on testy. "Tell me you wouldn't be interested in an economics major."

"Dating an economics major doesn't mean I want to be one myself. Besides, I don't like the professors at your college."

"You don't like the professors you currently have, either. Or your classmates. So why not transfer?"

"It's expensive and a lot of paperwork." I think I may have overextended the metaphor, as Sean's starting to look not only irate, but lost. "That's even assuming my application is accepted. So why not stick to the place I know?"

"For as long as that lasts? You think none of your professors have noticed your grades are slipping?"

The light bulb in the desk lamp pops into a tiny shower of glass. Sean and the human twitch. I smile, or maybe bare my teeth. Can't tell. "My grades are none of your business, Sean."

"Better to transfer than to flunk out. Taking a semester off didn't help, did it?"

"My grades. Are none of your business."

"Seriously, dude," says the college kid, leaning over the top of his carrel. "Her grades aren't any of your business."

"See?"

It makes me feel all warm inside when Sean has to make an effort to control his voice. "This is a private conversation," he says.

"Dude. You're in a library. You want a private conversation, maybe you should go somewhere, you know, not public."

"I would," says Sean, in a careful voice, "except that it's hard to have these conversations when people never go anywhere themselves." He glares down at me. "Seriously, do you two ever detach from each other? It's your life, fine, but I don't think switching all your classes to your boyfriend's so that you can spend more time with him is a healthy move. First time in a week I've managed to catch you alone."

"He has a point," says the college kid, and smiles at me. "But he's a jerk to bug you about it. Your boyfriend sounds like a jerk too. Want to go out with me instead? You could ditch both of them, go get a drink with me. I'm well-behaved, can open doors for ladies or not as you prefer, and I promise not to stalk you if you dump me later."

"Believe me," I say, "I'm tempted."

"Her boyfriend would break your arms," Sean says dryly. "So I wouldn't recommend it."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"Dude." The kid looks back at me, and shrugs. "Hey, if you just want a study partner some time, I'm not bad at constitutional law. Or you could _tell_ your boyfriend you're at a study group."

This is starting to get odd. Even by my standards. "Thanks, but no thanks. Can you point me towards the bathrooms on this floor?"

"You have to go down a floor for that. Head to the elevators, take a right, up the ramp, through to the compact stacks, down the staircase, out the door across the room, take a left, up the short flight of stairs at the end of the hallway, last door at the end past the offices." He ducks back into his carrel, reappears a moment later with a torn piece of paper. "Here's my number if you change your mind."

I stuff the number into a back pocket. With my luck, he's probably a Soldier of Judgment. "Thanks."

Sean tags along behind, ominously silent. And follows me up the ramp, down the stairs, through the stacks and up another flight of stairs to the bathroom, then inside.

"This is a woman's bathroom, Sean."

He ducks down to check the floor, then leans back against the door. "So what? Neither one of us qualifies more than the other in reality."

"Yes," I say, "but on the corporeal? We usually go by the vessel's plumbing. What do you _want_?"

"I want a deal." He reaches into his pocket, and produces a shiny white bead. An artifact I've heard about, but never seen before. "You know more than you should. You don't want to redeem? Fine. Theft wreaks havoc in the plans of Hell nearly as much as it does for Heaven, provides a cover for activities by the Wind, and otherwise has its uses. You can be dangerous when pressed, but as demons go, you're not all that threatening. So we can leave you to the fate you chose for yourself if that's what you insist on. Just...not with certain information."

"It wasn't a problem before."

"Before, Judgment wasn't looking for you. I don't think they'll catch you, since they won't try very hard. You're just not that important, Leo. Heaven's busy with bigger projects. But now that they have reason to interrogate you instead of kill you if they catch up, you're a security leak." He holds out the memory pearl. "This is the deal. We yank a few of your memories--nothing you'd consider important personally--and then we leave you alone. Permanently."

"Two problems with that." I hold up one finger. "Point the first, I don't trust you to keep your end of the deal. For all I know, you'd let me dangle for a few years, then drop in to pick me up and yank information back out of my mind."

"What, you don't trust me to keep my end of the bargain?" He tries to look offended. It would work better if I didn't know him so well. "Haven't I kept our deals in the past?"

"The ones negotiated on paper with Trade arbitrating, yes. And I still wouldn't put it past you to break those and eat the damage if you thought there was a good reason. War can't build up a reputation for being sneaky and treacherous, and then not expect people to think of it later."

"I wouldn't say we have a reputation for _treachery_ as such--"

"You do."

"Look," Sean says, "I'd be happy to do this as a nice little written contract, but I couldn't borrow Penny to drag around for a week, and this is the first chance I've had to talk with you alone. Or do you want to have this conversation in front of your partner?"

I'm not sure. "Intentions aside, you don't have any contract enforcement available on you now. Point the second? Even if you did, I wouldn't be willing to play along."

"I'm not asking you to betray anyone," Sean says. "I'm not even asking you to do any work. All you have to do is stuff this pearl in your mouth, think of a few specific events, and we're done with it. My ability to keep a bargain aside, don't you think it would reduce the probability of us wanting you dead if you didn't know certain things?"

"No messing with my head, Sean."

"It's not the Balseraph resonance. Just a memory pearl."

"No messing with my head." Zhune would understand, but Sean doesn't. I'll have to spell it out for him. "I've been through three Princes by now. That's three different dissonance conditions. Three different definitions of who I was supposed to be. I've been a student and an architect and a soldier and a substitute teacher and a thief. Every person I meet wants me to be something to suit them. I will be damned before I let you take away my memories. Those stay with me."

"It's five minutes of your life," Sean snaps. "Nothing that happened in those five minutes could matter to you. Five minutes!"

"And it's my life."

"Oh, hell, Leo, why did you have to choose now to develop principles? You're a demon. Express some moral flexibility. Be _pragmatic_."

"Come up with a solution that doesn't involve a career change or holes in my head, and I'll listen. Until then--" Disturbance, down below me and for I don't know what. "Oh, fuck."

Sean's still standing in front of the door. "I thought you were trying _not_ to attract notice? Or is your partner that incompetent?"

"If you want the floor beneath your feet to _not_ abruptly disappear, I recommend moving." 

The tiles under him crack, as a gentle hint. He pulls the door open for me, follows me out of the bathroom. "Now you're going to get screwed over, because of your choice in coworkers. You still have a chance to pull out."

The fire alarm begins whooping around us. "Isn't this your cue to make yourself scarce?"

"I can come up with a cover story better than you can."

I find my way back to the compressed stacks, and the staircase there. "Right up until they have a Seraph asking questions."

"If it comes down to it, I can shoot you and shut up."

"See, this sales pitch that isn't helping when you're trying to change my mind about cooperating." Two floors down, we're starting to see other people heading for the exits, most of the students grumbling and hauling stacks of books. By the time we reach the lobby, we're part of a small crowd moving to meet up with a larger crowd at the front entrance. Despite the exit signs throughout the building, everyone's moving towards the door they remember best.

"Aren't you supposed to be running?" Sean murmurs in my ear, now that we're tight-packed enough to be elbow to elbow with the humans. In other rooms, harried staff members are getting loud in their directions for patrons to put down their books and leave the building.

"What, and draw attention to myself?" A cluster of people moves into the lobby, and Zhune's among them, catching my eye from across the room. Followed by him catching sight of Sean, the only sign a brief blink as he makes his way at a steady pace with the rest of them. So they haven't figured out who made the disturbance yet. I can work with this.

"Kyrio's going to find you," Sean says. "And then what are you going to do?"

A ripple of concentration moves across the room, one panicking or obstinate human after another abruptly turning to move calmly in the direction of the exit, then returning to their delayed whining or freaking out as the Kyriotate moves on to another. No few of them check their pockets and backpacks as they walk towards the packed doors. Through the glass, I can make out the student worker trying to convince non-members who left their IDs at her desk to keep moving and ask for their cards back later, as the crowd tries to push past them.

Across the room, Zhune taps a staff member on the shoulder, says something quietly to her. Her face twists for a moment, trying to hold it in. "Fire!" she shrieks.

And now the humans _really_ want to get out of the building.

In the midst of the mob panic, Sean grabs my wrist. Enough people have started to shout that he doesn't even bother to drop his voice. "Your partner's vicious about manipulation, you know that? What is it with you and Balseraphs?"

Apparently talking a brand-new servant into a course of action can look like Balseraphing them into it, from across a room. "I think they're cute," I say, and push along with the rest of the crowd. The Kyriotate's having a hard time keeping people from panicking, even by jumping into the most hysterical to shut them up. So long as it's occupied with those, it won't have Forces spare to waste on the calm people who might have something in their pockets.

Not that I have anything stolen in my pockets, but I have a suspicion about Zhune's backpack.

Zhune slides through the crowd, not so fast as to draw attention but always finding a space exactly where he wants to step. He takes my other hand when he gets into grabbing range, leaving me with no hands free and two people attached to me while I'm trying to get to the exit. "I can't leave you alone for a minute, can I?"

"It's not my fault this is the week all my exes decided to jump me." I can't yank my hand out of Sean's without making enough of a fuss to draw attention from the Kyriotate. That grip's going to leave bruises.

Zhune comes to the same conclusion, after a narrow glare at the Mercurian, and begins pulling me towards the entrance. With him in front, we make brisk progress, though I take a backpack to the chin from a student turning too fast in front of me.

Behind us, the shouted directions to proceed in a calm fashion towards the exits can't drown out the people shouting about fire. There's not a whiff of smoke in the air, but enough people have heard the shout that the Kyriotate can't calm them up by taking them over. To my right, a student trips, slamming against my legs. I jerk back, find I'm being pulled ahead by Zhune on one side and back by Sean on the other as the Mercurian stops to help the kid up. "Hey!"

"Stop whining," Sean snaps at me, catching up, "if you don't want to draw attention."

"Because it's so obvious in the middle of this many panicking students."

Zhune's grip tightens. "Would the two of you shut up?" We're through the first set of doors, to the entryway packed with students trying to get out. All these backpacks aren't helping matters. He pulls me to the right, ahead, left, ahead, space opening for him as he moves, and closing up again in his wake. For me it's only uncomfortable; Sean's taking more than his share of shoving as he tries to follow the lead two places back.

Then sunlight's making me squint as we pull out into the open again. The crowd's dispersing, split between those students standing around waiting to get back inside or see the show and those who are taking the excuse to quit studying. Zhune yanks me towards a quieter stretch of path, well away from the library. Sean's still holding my other hand. The Djinn flashes a grin at the Mercurian. "You didn't want attention either, did you?"

Sean moves in closer on my left side, and Zhune presses in on the right, until we could be mistaken for a cluster of friends walking together. Except for the part where both my wrists are starting to ache. "I haven't made up my mind yet," Sean says. "Unlike you, as you seem to have given up on subtle."

Zhune shrugs. "It seemed like a good idea at the time." He's the one leading this little group, and so he's the one who decides we want to step off the main path to circle of benches around a burbling fountain. A bird cheeps in the branches, and all three of us twitch in that direction, waiting until it hops on, still cheeping, towards a hedge.

"The two of you can let go of me now," I say. "I'm not going anywhere." Neither of them lets go. Come to think of it, neither of them is even looking at me, being too busy glaring at each other. "If this is going to turn into a dick-measuring contest, I'm going to break for lunch and come back when you're finished."

"I'm reasonably sure," Sean says, "that I could shoot you before you did the reverse, given that you don't have any armed humans to do the work for you this time."

Zhune smiles toothily. "And I'm sure Leo could take out your weapons before you got many shots off, unless you've picked up a new artifact since last time."

"And I think that if anyone is going to start shooting, I'd rather be somewhere else when it happens, what with the fire department showing up any minute now, and possibly the police." I yank at both grips, and make no progress. "Are either of you listening to me?"

"You assume she would bother to stop me," Sean says. "Maybe she'd rather not be stuck in this partnership if she has a chance to get out of it."

"And you believe she'd run off with you instead? She's not stupid. Besides, if she wanted me dead, she could have done that long ago."

"Is anyone listening to me, here?" I sit down on a bench, my arms spread on either side of me. "This is inane." The fire trucks have arrived, sirens blaring over the wail of the fire alarm inside the library. It's a pity Zhune didn't actually start a fire. It would have given me something more interesting to pay attention to.

"Did she ever tell you that she worked with me before? You're basing your assumptions on incomplete data." Sean's reaching, now. And up until recently, that comment would have been awkward for me. Pity he's late on dropping that info.

"Of course she told me," Zhune says. "She's my partner. She's not going to keep me in the dark about her history." Once again, he's giving me more credit than I'm due. Maybe after all those years of having my supervisors and coworkers downplay my achievements, it's only fair.

"And this doesn't _bother_ you?"

"Should it?" Zhune's so far into Djinn blandness that it must be cluing the Mercurian into the nature of his Band.

"Doesn't anyone care what I think about this?" I kick Sean in the knee. Not hard enough for him to react, but it makes me feel better. The alarm in the building has been turned off. "Go away. Let me be paranoid about when you might show up again. I'll deal. If we sit here much longer, someone we all want to avoid is going to notice."

Sean tucks his hands into his pockets. "You're being stupid about this."

"Like that's ever stopped me before." I get my hand back from Zhune, fold my arms. "I'm sure you can gloat about it when it causes me problems. But right now, I'm busy."

"I'll see you later," says the Mercurian. That sounds like a threat. "Right now? You're not important enough for me to waste any more time on this."

"Dude." All three of us turn to look at the blond boy standing just outside the cluster of benches, as he stares mildly back at us. "That was harsh."

"Oh, for the love of--" Sean throws up his hands. " _Fine_. It's your life. Deal with it." And stomps away, with as much maturity as his vessel age suggests.

I stand up, tuck my hand back in Zhune's. "Thanks," I say to the human.

"No problem." The kid looks my partner up and down, decides he's outclassed by my existing boyfriend. "You could get a restraining order, you know. If he keeps hassling you like that."

"Or I could break his legs," Zhune says.

"Tempting." I kiss the Djinn on the cheek, standing on my tip-toes to do it. Next time I get to put in a vessel request, I'm going to be specific. I want to be _taller_. And male again. I turn back to the human, who's probably been in that library often enough to not get a second glance from any Aware staff member looking for suspicious parties outside. One hand out, I say, "Hey. I never got your name. I'm Leah, this is John. I was only visiting campus, so I don't know the area. Think you could show us some place that carries decent beer? Far enough off campus that my ex won't run into me there?"

"Sure," says the kid, pleased. He shakes my hand, then Zhune's. "The name's Dave. If you can live with salsa music, I know a place with great imports."

"Perfect."

As we walk away, the space between my shoulders itches, as if someone's about to shoot me in the back. But, hey, that's nothing new.


	21. In Which Presents Are Given

Nobody else hangs around a hotel pool at four in the morning, which is why we've chosen that time to go swimming. More precisely, why Zhune has chosen that time to go swimming. I've chosen to stick close to him on the principle of not wanting to get shot in the back.

"You should come in," Zhune says, surfacing from the water. "They've gone to all the trouble of heating the pool. Might as well use it."

"You just want to see me in a bikini." I turn another page in my book. It's a pity I'm so young; it would have been nice to slap Trollope around while he was still alive and writing. How can an author with such a perfect ability to pace his novels write such whiney characters?

"Since you haven't acquired a bikini, I don't see that happening, but I'd settle for you in a wet T-shirt."

"Unlikely. And if you get my book wet," I add, as water hits my toes from his climb out of the pool, "I will hurt you."

"It's going to fall apart in a few days anyway." He drops down into a lounge chair beside me.

"But not until I'm done reading it." He has a point, and it's the reason I buy paperbacks. "What's your point? Did you want to read it?"

"Not enough action for me," Zhune says, digging the towel out from the bag under the chair. He dries his hair off. On him, messy hair looks sexy. If I have to wear a stylish vessel, I want one more like his. "How can a book that thick contain no plot of interest whatsoever? You'd think that in the midst of all the worrying over who the protagonist is going to marry, the author could have thrown in a gunfight or something."

"So you _have_ tried reading it."

"You were in the shower. I was bored. The book didn't help."

"Your loss." I flip to another page pointedly. The book's looking dog-eared and worn, but it'll hold together long enough for me to finish the story.

"You two make such a cute couple," says our Prince, who doesn't need to bother with details like opening doors to be standing in front of us. Both of us scramble to our feet, Zhune more elegantly than I can. "Andre would approve. So what do you have for me? Or did you need more time?"

It would be impolitic to point out that he's two days early. If the War was all about punctuality, Theft appears to be more fond of throwing people off-guard. "One thing," Zhune says. He pulls the backpack out from under the chair. Neither of us thought it was a good idea to leave it sitting in the hotel room unguarded. "We stopped by a library in a Judgment Tether. While a book seemed traditional, I thought you might find this useful."

The wire-wrapped crystal was made of pink quartz, but currently looks a sickly pinkish gray, the surface swirling with oily patterns. Valefor picks the Force Catcher up by the silver chain, spins it around in front of him. "What a lucky break for you," he says. "You got this out without tipping them off?"

Zhune watches our Prince blandly. "Opportunity knocked," he says. "They've noticed by now that it's gone, but we didn't leave any bodies behind, or much in the way of evidence. There might have been security cameras."

"Not a bad catch," says Valefor, and the artifact vanishes from his fingers. "What makes Renegades so entertaining is that you can usually find two people bidding for their return." I wonder if the Shedite trapped in there will find itself with an offer like the one I received, and if it'll consider this a step up from being held by Judgment for trial and execution. It hasn't been the most forthcoming in speech since we picked it up. He smiles at us, sharp and focused. I'm ever reminded that he's my own Band, able to break us whenever he feels like it. "What do you want in exchange for that?" 

He aimed that question at me, not both of us. Not to get killed? Ask for too little and I look like a coward. Ask for too much and get slapped for thinking too highly of myself. Come to think of it, I _am_ a coward. Let's go with the predictable answer and hope he wasn't looking for creativity. "Your Calabite attunement," I say. I'm not quite a proper Servitor until I have that.

"Finding it too hard to escape on your own?" I don't think he knows the half of it. But he smiles as if he's amused, not annoyed, so that was the right answer. There's a moment of knowing, and then the attunement settles into the back of my soul with the one I'm still carrying from Fire. "Zhune, sounds like you ought to brush up on keeping track of your attuned. Do you need a leash?"

The Djinn doesn't look at me. Even dripping in swim trunks, he can project more personal confidence than I can dry and clothed. Maybe it comes with age and experience. "She hasn't tried to run from me yet. A means of fending off those who want to abduct her would be more useful."

I can't tell if that's intentionally vague, or perfectly clear to the two of them due to data I don't have. "Trying to be a good dog? If that's what makes you happy." Valefor flicks a gesture at the Djinn, and then glances over the book in his hands. The one I _thought_ I was holding. Show-off. "Brushing up on the classics? You have strange hobbies, Leo." He tosses the book back to me. I catch it without fumbling, some small consolation for the notice. What's wrong with appreciating good literature? People keep acting like they've seen a singing pig to find a Calabite reading. "I'd love to stand around and chat with you kids, but I have places to go and people to steal. Have fun, and don't get caught."

He strolls off through the door to the hotel rather than vanishing. I feel sorry for the lobby staff.

Zhune pulls me into a kiss, fast enough that I wasn't expecting it. "What, you don't like people dragging you around?"

"You're getting my shirt wet."

"It's an improvement." He lets me pull away. So far as I'm not running, I can always pull away. It's only an illusion of freedom. I'm not going to get the real thing. "Give me a minute to get dressed, and we can go have fun."

"So long as this fun doesn't involve a Tether."

"Spoilsport."

"Risk junkie."

Zhune leans in to whisper in my ear. "Redemption bait." And laughs at my twitch. "Come on, little sister. Can't stand around in one place too long, or our sins catch up with us." He throws the towel over his shoulder, sauntering off towards the door.

"We wouldn't want that." I follow him along, trying to find my place again in the book. At least he didn't ask for the leash.


End file.
